Day of Judgment
by RedFalcon2419
Summary: An Iraqi Radical seeks revenge against the soldier who killed his brother. Justin's disappearance and his fate revealed by two brave orphan girls leads Rebecca and the Walkers to the Middle East to find him before it's too late.
1. The Debt

Day of Judgment

Chapter 1 – The Debt

The twilight hours of night in Pasadena, California were never the easiest to sleep through, and the transition from the tranquil surroundings of his childhood home to the boisterous downtown areas of the city was a slow one for Justin Walker. He hadn't slept a wink the night before and thankfully he'd had the day off the following day, when he'd taken a 6 ½ hour nap during the day when he visited Rebecca. Now, as he sat on the futon that had been in Tommy and Julia's garage for three years, he flipped through the channels on TV as the seconds of the night slowly passed. He occasionally glanced around at his new apartment, and it just made him miss home even more. The walls were bone white, Gray tiles lined the floor, some of them chipped and cracked. The bathroom needed a new shower head and a new light, and the bedroom was a mess considering he hadn't been to the Laundromat for almost an entire week. It made him feel hopeless at times, but every time he coaxed himself out of that fear by remembering his sister's words; "_If there's anybody who knows how to be brave, it's you._"

That helped settle his nerves, but not by very much. He couldn't tell anybody what the real problem was, not his Mom, siblings, even Rebecca. He couldn't put them in danger. He knew something was coming, but he just didn't know what it was. He did know, however, where it was coming from. As he turned on ESPN and watched a replay between the Chicago Bulls and the Los Angeles Lakers, he slowly began falling asleep.

_Eighteen Months Earlier_

_27 Miles Southwest of Baghdad, Iraq_

_The Infantry had been among those stationed in a high-conflict area where there was said to be some violence going on. There had been two bombings in the past week that had killed 37 people, including four children. The unit's transports came to a thundering halt at the village square. Justin looked at the people's faces. He saw what was typical all over Iraq. Some people were glad to see them putting an end to the fighting, while others simply glared back at him in such a way that he could feel the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end. _

_There was evidence of violence throughout the village. Broken glass lied at the foot of smashed in windows, and splintered wood was scattered about from what had once been fences and doors. The hardest hit in the village was a small Shiite temple, as most of the village was Shiite. He remembered seeing men and women trying to salvage things out of there. A woman was standing at the center of the open ruin, sobbing as she held what looked like a yellow and tan knit afghan. _

_His memories jumped next to the gunfire. Five men in a red jeep blazed into the town towards the already ruined temple, while about ten others ran through the town, firing into houses and through windows. Many of the men in the village, alongside Justin's unit, took up arms to ward off the invaders. At one moment, he saw a young girl, about Paige's age, crying out for help as the jeep began storming right towards her. He heard the engine revving up and saw it gaining speed. Out of instinct, he broke into a dash towards the girl. Fifteen feet away, twelve feet, ten, seven, four, two, the jeep was less than a few feet away, he heard the girl scream, and he quickly scooped her off the ground and dove out of the jeep's path and landed on the ground. As he shielded her with his arms, he reached for his gun, which had landed a few feet away, and joined in at the others shooting at the jeep. He watched as two of the men fell from the jeep, dead. Two more jumped just before the startled driver crashed the jeep into a stone wall near the edge of the village. The driver jumped from the burning jeep. Justin didn't see him though. He turned down to help the little girl up to her feet, and as he did, he felt somebody grab the back of his uniform and tear him off the girl and the next thing he knew, he was pinned on his back by a tall man with a frizzed beard. The man's eyes were wide and he was grinding his yellow teeth in anger, but he did hold steady the dagger against Justin's throat. He said one thing in anger, in almost perfect English,_

_"You have dishonored my brother's name, and I shall restore his honor with your blood!"_

_Justin felt his body freeze for a split second. His breath froze, his heart skipped a beat, and he snapped his eyes shut. Before he drew in what he honestly thought would be his last breath, a tall girl with dark hair kicked the man off of him with a tremendous force and four Iraqi men tackled his assailant before dragging him away. He turned and saw them drag him towards a large stone building, and as Justin stood up, he heard that same man shout "In the name of Allah, I will have his blood!". _

_"You're fine, Walker." One of his comrades told him as they returned to their transport vehicle. The men had either all been killed or escaped, except for Rabu Al Wasli, the man who'd almost taken his life. He'd learned his name from the court hearings in Baghdad four days later. He'd also learned that the girl he'd apparently saved was nine year old Jadia, an orphan from that village. At that hearing, he'd been confronted by Jadia's Grandmother, whom in her gratitude gave him a small stone cross with a blue jewel on it. It wasn't that big and was barely the size of his thumb, so he attached it to a leather strand and tied it around his wrist. The last thing he remembered hearing from Rabu was "A Black Feather will mark the signal for your day of Judgment."_

_BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP_

Justin snapped out of his dream when the alarm on his makeshift night stand. His shirt was stained with sweat and he felt as if he'd spent the night in the middle of the Mojave Desert. He wanted it all to be a dream, but he knew that it wasn't because of the cross still tied to his wrist from Jadia's Grandmother. He also knew it wasn't a dream because of the long black feather he'd found stuck to the windshield of his jeep. Around the tip of the feather was a red string holding four beads made of stones from a desert he never wished to see again.

To Be Continued……

(Copyright: The Characters from _Brothers and Sisters_ are the property of ABC. I don't own them.

If I get any facts messed up, let me know so I can change them. )


	2. Sibling Intuition

Chapter 2 – Sibling's Intuition

"No, he barely slept at all last night." Rebecca told Sarah over her cell phone, watching Justin sleep on her couch. He'd been so exhausted that the military recruitment office sent him home early and he couldn't drive clear across Pasadena, so Rebecca had picked him up and he'd been out like a light for almost two hours. "and this isn't the first time this has happened." She leaned over him to kiss him, just to let him know she was there, and after she did, the odor hit her. "And it looks like he hasn't showered lately either."

"Oh, boy. That's not a good sign." Sarah said as she went over more papers for Greenatopia. She'd tried to slow down on the work so she could make time for Paige and Cooper, and now that they were staying with Joe and Paula for the next week, she was catching up on her work. "Does he seem sick at all?"

"Nope." Rebecca answered. "I've checked his temperature twice since he's been sleeping and he's normal." She looked at the ear thermometer on the table and wondered if it was working properly. She glanced back at her couch and watched Justin roll over onto his side, then a few moments later he turned back onto his stomach, and the whole time he was groaning in his sleep. Rebecca sat there for a moment, pondering about this strange and rather familiar behavior in the guy she'd seen walk through fire several times in the two years since knowing him. He'd been to war twice and battled drug addiction, now he couldn't even conquer sleeping. "Sarah, something tells me he's thinking about Iraq."

"Yeah, that's what I was thinking too." Sarah replied.

"Should I call your mom?"

Sarah paused for a moment. "I think it's too early to bring her into this. Justin wouldn't want to upset her if it wasn't necessary, which is probably why he's hiding what's bothering him." Staying on her cell, she quickly paced across her kitchen to the home phone and began dialing Kitty's number. "I'm sending over a specialist on this."

Within fifteen minutes, Kitty McAllister was in the car and on her way across town. She was interested in seeing Rebecca's new apartment, but still worried about Justin. She had that feeling in the pit of her stomach that she got every time something in the family was going wrong.

"Kitty, watch out!" A woman's voice snapped Kitty out of her daze and she stopped just before running a red light. She looked to the passenger seat and saw Julia looking at her.

"Whew. Thank you." Kitty said, brushing a strand of hair out of her face and waiting for the signal to turn.

"He's going into it again, isn't he?" Julia asked, referring to Justin. "A downward spiral."

Kitty nodded. "According to Rebecca, he's barely slept through the night in almost three weeks, barely eaten anything, and apparently not showered either. He's being really quiet, which means he's trying to hide something."

"Oh God." Julia said in a hushed tone. Kitty knew that aside from Justin, nobody in the family knew this phase of life better than Julia. After losing William she'd gone into a spiral herself, and then almost a second time when they almost lost Elizabeth after her liver failed. She'd almost lost Tommy, and the life she had with him.

"Thanks for coming along." Kitty said, turning onto Rebecca's street.

"It's not a problem." Julia answered. "I'm just thinking about how I'm going to tell Tommy about this."

"Yeah, I was just thinking the same thing about Kevin." Kitty remarked, pulling out her cell phone and dialing Rebecca's number. "Neither of them have ever been good at talking about their real problems, must get it from our Dad." Kitty pulled into the parking lot of the apartment complex where Rebecca lived. She could automatically tell which door was Rebecca's by spotting the wooden crate with the Ojai Foods label printed on the side. The two women walked across the parking lot to the door. As they did, Kitty noticed a man standing near the Landlord's office, leaning against the wall. She noticed he was staring right at the window for Rebecca's apartment. A few moment's later, Julia noticed it, too. "That's got to be the strangest tattoo I've ever seen." Julia whispered, talking about the markings on the man's left arm which from a distance looked like large brown Chinese symbols. The man looked over towards them, which is when they both looked back towards Rebecca's apartment, seeing Rebecca at the door. Julia went inside first, and Kitty paused for a moment to look back at that man. He was gone.

"No, Kevin hasn't mentioned speaking to Justin lately." Scotty told Sarah over the phone from his restaurant. "Actually, I haven't heard from him in almost a month it seems."

"Don't feel bad." Sarah answered. "Apparently he's been that way with quite a few people lately."

"Is he alright?"

"Haven't a clue." Sarah said, dialing the number for Walker Landing on her home phone. "Kitty and Julia went over to Rebecca's to see him."

"Wow, nice multi-tasking." Scotty complimented. "I can hear you're on two phones."

"When you're the oldest of five it becomes like instinct." Sarah said, smirking a little.

"Well, I'll tell Kevin to call you as soon as I can, but now I've got a review to complete."

"Good Luck, Scotty!" Sarah called loudly as she hung up her cell phone and began talking to the secretary at Walker Landing.

"Why is he so pale?" Kitty asked, feeling Justin's forehead.

"Last time I checked his Refrigerator, all I saw was an empty jar of peanut butter and a banana." Rebecca said. The two of them glanced at Julia, who was on her cell phone trying to get a hold of Kevin. She'd tried getting Tommy twice, but he was at a meeting.

"Wait a second." Kitty said softly as her hands approached Justin's face. She could see the swelling under his eyes from lack of sleep had gotten worse since the last time she'd seen him, plus he hadn't shaved his face in a while and was getting scruffy. Her first remark was he looked like Paul Bunyan. She carefully lifted his eyelid to see if he was high. "He's not stoned."

"Well, that's _one_ relief." Rebecca said. Just then, Justin began murmuring things in his sleep.

"Justin?" Kitty asked as she and Rebecca leaned in to listen to what he was saying. Julia closed her cell and came over to them when she heard the voices.

"_I'm sorry, I'm sorry." _He whispered softly in his sleep.

"Hey, Justin?" Rebecca asked. The three women leaned over him to get a good listen when,

"AHHHHHH!" Justin shouted and the three of them Screamed simultaneously.

"What are you guys doing?" He asked hoarsely.

"Checking on you." Kitty answered. "You look terrible." Justin glared at her, then at Rebecca.

"You don't need to worry, I'm just fine." He said, trying to calm his sister, sister in law, and girlfriend.

"Yeah, and I'm just Danish." Kitty answered sarcastically. "Come on, what's wrong."

"Nothing's wrong."

"Justin-"

"NOTHING IS WRONG!" He barked. The three women each took a step back from him. At this point, Kitty noticed the look he had in his eyes. He'd had it when they were sending him to Afghanistan, every time he'd relapsed into another addiction, and when they'd sent him to Iraq. He was scared about something.

"Tell me, Justin." Kitty said firmly. Justin paused for a moment.

"Okay, something is wrong, but I'm already taking care of it." He answered, taking a deep breath. "It's just a little nerve rattling."

"What is it, Justin?" Rebecca asked.

"Come on, Justin. You can trust us." Julia added.

"This I can't trust with anybody." He answered indefinitely. It seemed to Kitty like a forced answer, but she had to remember he wasn't the baby brother she'd taught how to ride a bike or throw a ball anymore. He was a man now.

"Okay, but if you've already taken care of this problem of yours, now you need to take care of yourself."

"I know." Justin answered, stretching his arms out.

"Here's an idea." Rebecca said. "Why don't we go out to dinner tonight. I know I've been bust and to be honest I could use some fun. Are you up for it?"

Justin looked at her, giving her that look that almost made her knees buckle. "You bet I am."

"Great." Kitty said. "Well, Julia, I think our work here is done."

"I do agree." Julia answered. I have to pick up Lizzie from daycare soon, wanna come along?"

"Sure." The two women gathered themselves and headed out. After Rebecca saw them out, she turned back to Justin.

"It's still pretty early." She said, kneeling next to him. "You can rest for a while longer."

"Thanks." He said. He extended his arms out and she hugged him, followed by a long kiss. "After you rest, you need a shower." They both laughed a little. She stayed in his arms for a few moments.

"Are you sure you're alright?" She asked, resting her head on his chest.

"Yes."

"Promise?"

"I Promise."

To Be Continued…….


	3. Taken Back

Chapter 3 – Taken Back

Just like she had done when he came back from Iraq, Rebecca stood by Justin as he coped with whatever he was dealing with, or that was it from her point of view. He's rested to a point to whereas the deep circles under his eyes had faded to curved lines. He shaved his beard down to the manageable stubble it usually was, and he'd showered twice before he and Rebecca stopped at his place so he could change his clothes. He snapped into a few pieces from his tuxedo from the Pasadena Children's Hospital benefit. He didn't wear a tie, mainly because if he kept breathing so hard he might choke himself to death. Rebecca hadn't even seen the shock on his face that he tried to hide when she checked his mail. In his mailbox, there was a second black feather, this one had only two very familiar looking stones tied to it. While Rebecca had run to the grocery store down the block to replenish his barren refrigerator, Justin was in his bedroom trying to sort through everything that was happening.

He paced back and forth across his bedroom, combing his fingers through his messy hair and trying to control his breathing. He thought he was losing his mind over two black feathers. He went into the bathroom and splashed cold water on his face. He blinked madly as he reached for a towel, Once he had his face dried, he looked at himself in the mirror. It made him think of how his life had been like a rollercoaster ride for the past 13 years. Over the past two, he'd learned a great deal about life, most of which he felt was owed to Rebecca. He took a deep sigh and returned to his room, sitting on his bed across the dresser. He slowly opened the drawer to the nightstand and pulled out a sock with a small square object inside it. He pulled from the sock something he'd spent almost half his yearly salary on. He slowly opened it up to reveal a silver ring with a blue stone. He'd bought it for Rebecca because as soon as he'd seen it in the case at the store, he thought of her. The stone was in the deepest shade of blue that it almost looked black without light, and it was shaped to look slightly like a heart. He thought of how deep her love was for not only him, but for everything. He smiled over the thought of her learning to surf, taking up photography, things that made her happy. It was deeper than the deepest oceans. It was a promise ring for her, and inside he'd had inscribed "_You hold the key to my heart, just as you always will."_

The thought of those Arabs coming after him didn't scare him. If they wanted to confront him for something he did, than he wasn't going to hide from them. It was that state of mind that had led him to drugs and alcohol. Even more, dying didn't scare him, considering that he'd stared death right in the eye multiple times over the past few years. The only thing that rocked him so badly into this panic he felt trapped within was the thought of what him getting hurt or even killed would do to his family. His mom had already lost so much, he didn't like thinking about putting her through that again. Sarah, Kitty, Tommy, and Kevin. They'd always taken care of him as the youngest Walker, and even when he was almost 30 years old they still took time away from their own lives to help him with his. There had been times where he had returned the favor, like bringing Tommy and Kevin out of their last feud, or attempting to at least. On top of that, he'd watched the family grow. Julia, Robert, Scotty, Paige and Cooper, little Elizabeth, and now the baby Kitty and Robert would call their own. He wanted Rebecca to have that.

He was tired of that fear he'd carried with him all those years of his ups and downs. If this was really happening, he would face it. He had to.

"_Justin?_" Rebecca's voice echoed from the entrance. He was startled by her voice, quickly shoving the ring box into his coat pocket and leaping to his feet to find his shoes. "_We've got reservations in 30 minutes and it's a long drive.."_ She said as she walked into the room and saw him digging through the pile of sandals and sneakers trying to find his dress shoes.

"Justin?" She interrupted his searching, with him looking up hastily. His face turned into a weak smile when he saw her holding the shoes.

"You were polishing them in the kitchen, remember?"

"Right." Justin said, snapping his fingers. She stepped back when she noticed how nicely he was dressed, then looked down at her black blouse and white skirt.

"Justin, are you sure this place isn't too expensive?"

"Yes, I'm sure."

"You know I'd be perfectly happy going out to Outback Steakhouse."

"Come on, can't I take my girl out to a nice place for once?" He took the shoes from her and as he put them on, Rebecca sized up his outfit. She also noticed the ironing board and iron out in the corner of the room, along with a lint brush and a needle and a spool of thread nearby.

"Wow." She stated, walking towards the ironing board. "Looks like somebody's been dragging out the power tools."

"Hey, my slacks were a bit wrinkled up, my jacket got a little dirty in the closet, and I had to sew a button back on."

"Since when do you know how to sew?"

"I looked it up online."

Rebecca gave him a raised eyebrow. "You're going to some pretty unusual extremes tonight, even for you."

"Well, I wanted tonight to be really special for the two of us." He said, glancing up at her and pausing for a moment with her in his sights. To her, the look made her a little uneasy. He looked as if he'd done something wrong and was trying to hide it from her. At first she began to feel a little upset, almost angry at him for keeping this from her, but before she said something she checked herself. She knew he was still coping with some of the things he'd seen in the war.

"Justin?" She asked softly. Justin snapped out of his daze and looked at her clearly.

"Oh, sorry for staring." He said softly in the same tone. "You just look beautiful, that's all." She blushed a little and slowly walked over to him as he stood by the bathroom door. She put her hands gently around his neck and kissed him for a few moments.

"Promise me that you're alright."

"Rebecca, I already did."

"Please." She pleaded. It took Justin a moment or two, but he finally calmed himself and gave her that look which proved to her he was telling the truth.

"I promise." He said, taking her in his arms and holding her. They stood there for a few moments. Rebecca didn't say anything as he held her. She just rested her head on his shoulder and let him stand there for a few more moments. She knew this helped him.

"Okay, we'd better get going." Justin said as he released her from his arms. As she went to get her shawl, he made his hand into a fist and rested it on the wall, then resting his forehead on his fist and taking in a moment of silence.

"Justin, are you coming?" Rebecca called from the other room.

"Coming!" He called back as he turned around. He saw his reflection in the window and could see what a mess he was on the inside. As he and Rebecca left to head to the restaurant, he couldn't help but notice the guy in the car across the street, glaring at him as he and Rebecca got into her car and drove off.

The two of them headed off for a romantic night at one of the top Italian restaurants in the city. The entire way there, Justin was glancing in the mirror, seeing if that red car was still following. He'd hoped it was just somebody in a similar car going on a similar path, but at almost every corner they turned, there he was again. He didn't disappear until just before they got to the restaurant downtown, at which point he turned into a parking garage down the street. It looked like a typical Saturday Evening in Pasadena, as several couples poured into the restaurant to have a good time. For Rebecca's sake, Justin forced himself into a good mood. He kept his spirits high through dinner as best he could. Before long, he did really start to relax. The restaurant had a large ballroom and couples were dancing to ragtime tunes.

"Are you up for a dance?" Justin asked.

"To oldies?" Rebecca said with a raised eyebrow.

"Come on, you can't knock it till you try it." He said with a laugh. She paused for a moment before returning a smile.

"Alright. I was hoping for a dance or something along that line tonight."

They took to the floor for what seemed like ages. It reminded Justin of his Senior Prom, just without the corny tie. It was moments like this that would normally ease his tension, but he still was trying really hard to shake it off with no avail.

"It's getting rough isn't it?" Rebecca asked. Justin looked up at her tentatively. "The memories."

He nodded.

"Justin, if you're having this much trouble dealing with the past, maybe it's time to leave it in the past where it belongs. I know it'll be hard, but I'll-"

"It's not the past I'm worried about." Justin Interrupted. Rebecca looked at him in a puzzled way.

"What?"

Justin paused for a moment. "This isn't the perfect place to talk about this."

"Okay, can we go outside an talk then?" Rebecca asked, eager to figure out what was really going on. He seemed like he was doing better but couldn't shake the feeling something else was wrong.

"Justin," Rebecca started, taking a deep breath. "Are you using again?"

"No."

"Are they sending you back?"

"No, not them." That comment caught Rebecca off guard.

"Wait a second, what do you mean _not them_?"

Justin sighed as he motioned for them to step outside. Rebecca quickly grabbed her purse and shawl and followed Justin out the door. The two of them went to the alleyway, Justin nervously glancing around. They walked for quite a ways deep into an alleyway bordered on both sides. It was musty and dark, and Justin stopped by a light behind a Laundromat.

"Justin, how bad is this really, considering that we've almost gone into hiding now I'm starting to believe this is really bad."

"It is." Justin said, turning to her and pausing for a moment to gather himself. "Do you remember how I told you about that court trial I participated in in Baghdad about a month before I got sent home?" Justin asked.

"Yes." Rebecca answered. "Your mom was practically giving herself a stroke over the incident."

"The guy I shot down," Justin said slowly. "His brother swore to get revenge on me."

Rebecca gasped. She was both shocked and confused, but she still didn't understand. Justin pulled the two feathers out of his pocket.

"He told me before he went to jail that when I saw these it meant they were coming." Justin told her. "I read an article online that said he and a bunch of other militants from that group escaped from jail."

"Oh God." Rebecca said in a hushed tone. "Have you tried going to the police or to your officers?"

"No, I couldn't It's too risky, they might come after any of you."

"How do you know?"

"With the first feather was a note with your business card attached to it." Justin said, looking at her with that look that told her what he was really scared for. "They know where you live."

Rebecca was still in shock as she put her hand on Justin's Shoulder. "Let's get out of here."

"_You're not going anywhere_." The two of them jumped at that sound and turned to see two men standing a few feet behind them. They hadn't even heard them coming. Although the light was dim, Justin could tell right away who they were. Justin quickly stood out towards them, pushing Rebecca gently behind him.

"_We've heard a lot about you, Justin Walker_." One of them said in an Arab accent. "_You've taken something from us, now it is time that you give it back_."

"What do you want?" Justin asked firmly. He began to back against the wall, motioning to Rebecca to do the same.

"_We can't discuss this here._" The other man said in a thicker accent than the first one. "_You're coming with us_."

Just at that moment, a bright light illuminated the alley dimly and a large white van was seen parked in the alley about 15 feet away. Justin watched as two other men joined in and the four of them began to close in on them. When he saw one of them had a knife, he quickly glanced backwards. Rebecca was now against the wall and there was a door behind them which lead to a utility room for the Laundromat. He quickly grabbed the doorknob and flung the door open, pushing Rebecca inside before moving to shut it behind her.

"Justin wait-" Rebecca said as she looked back at him.

"I love you." He whispered gently as he slammed the door and turned back to his assailants.

"Justin!" Rebecca shouted as she leapt to the door. She heard a large struggle going on and a lot of yelling. Twice something or someone was thrown against the door, the bangs against the metal almost ear-splitting. She could hear garbage cans crashing around and punches being thrown. She couldn't hear any of the dialect, except just before it ended she heard one of the men yell "_Leave her!_". The last thing she heard was a car engine starting and tires squealing for a split second, then the noise stopped.

"Justin?" Rebecca said shakily, reaching for the door. She tried to open it, but it was stuck. "Justin!" She called out worriedly. She took a step back and tried to ram the door open. She hit twice with her shoulder until the door opened and she stumbled out of her shelter. She stumbled out and fell to the ground. There was garbage everywhere and two tire tracks running through it off into nowhere. She looked one way down the alley, then the other. Nothing. The light had been broken by the door, and it was getting darker out faster.

"JUSTIN!"


	4. Shock

Chapter 4 – Shock

Rebecca stood in the darkness alone, almost in a daze. She was hyperventilating over what had just happened, and was now frantically searching through her purse for her cell phone. When she finally found it, she flipped it open and discovered that it wasn't her phone; it was Justin's. Her phone was green, and his was black and red. As she opened it, the picture of him and Kevin and Tommy at the beach almost brought tears to her eyes as she frantically dialed Kitty's number.

"_Oh God, Oh God, Oh God" _Rebecca repeated in her mind, choking over her own thoughts even. The phone rang twice and finally Kitty answered.

"Hello?" Kitty answered. "Justin?"

"Kitty, it's Rebecca." Rebecca said shakily. Her voice was labored because now she started shaking.

"Rebecca? Is something wrong?" A tear began rolling down the side of Rebecca's face as she prepared herself to tell Justin's sister that she might possibly never see him again.

"Something _was_ wrong." Rebecca said, crying softly. "Very wrong, Kitty."

"Woah, wait a minute, what are you talking about?" Kitty asked nervously. "Where's Justin?"

Rebecca glanced around the alley before speaking. "He's gone, Kitty."

"What?"

"That's all I can say at the moment, are you at home?"

Yes, I'm home, Robert's here too, wait, where has he gone?"

"I don't know, but can I come over, we've got a huge problem."

"Yes, yes, of course." Kitty answered. "Do I need to call the police or anything?"

"No. Not yet." Rebecca answered. "But you'd better call everybody else."

"Okay, I will."

"I'll be there as fast as I can." Rebecca said before hanging up. She took off down the alley as fast as she could racing to get back to her car. Nobody even seemed to notice what had happened, barely anybody was around when she got to her car. In her mind aside from the freaking out, she was praying for Justin, for all the Walkers. She had a feeling this was going to be disastrous.

"She didn't say anything?" Robert asked, puzzled.

"All she said was that he was gone." Kitty said. "This must be bad, I knew something was wrong that he wasn't telling us, I just knew it!" She said nervously, ringing her hands. Sarah was on her way, Tommy was coming with Julia, but she couldn't get a hold of Kevin and Scotty. Right now her main focus was getting a hold of her nerves. What could have happened? Were they jumped by a gang or something, or did Justin get involved with the wrong people back when he was using? She didn't know which could be true, but she did know they both scared her. Then she heard a knock at the door. She jumped to her feet from where she had been on the couch, Robert following. The second she opened the door, Rebecca just wrapped her arms around Kitty and sobbed.

"Rebecca?" Kitty asked her.

"Oh God, Kitty." She sobbed. Her voice was hoarse and her eyes were red, and she was trembling.

"Here, come on in and sit down." Kitty said as she led Rebecca to the living room. Robert closed the front door and joined them. Rebecca tried to calm herself down, and was able to do so just enough so that she could talk clearly. "Just before it happened, he told me the truth about what was going on."

Kitty looked at her with concern, then looked up to Robert, who took his reading glasses off and sat down next to Kitty to listen.

"When He was in Iraq, he'd been involved in the court case against the leader of a Sunni Militant group."

"I remember that." Robert said, recalling from when he'd been keeping track of all the incidents on the war in Iraq while Justin was there. "His name was Al Wasli, they sent him to prison following that."

Rebecca looked at them with some confusion. "He never told me about that."

"Justin told me that he'd shot down Faram Al Wasli, that leader's brother, right after they almost killed a child in the attack on the village. Justin's unit and the locals managed to drive the militants away except for a few who were captured. A lot of them were sent to Prison."

"Well, Justin told me that he and a few others had escaped, and now they were coming after him."

Kitty gasped. Her eyes widened to form that look Kitty hadn't had on her face in almost eight years. Rebecca lowered her head and tried to hold in a few sobs.

"Rebecca, where is he?" Robert asked.

"Four Arab men came and took him just after he told me this." Both Kitty and Robert froze in shock. After a moment, Robert stood up and walked across the living room slowly, running his fingers through his hair. Kitty still sat on the couch next to Rebecca. She didn't speak for a few minutes.

"Did they say anything?" Robert asked, referring to the men who took him.

"Just that they wanted back what he took from them." Rebecca said. Robert paused for a moment, and then took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a moment. Kitty looked up at him slowly with a confused look on her face. "What does that mean?"

"I think I might know," Robert said, heading to his office. "I'm just hoping that I'm wrong." As soon as he headed down the hall, Kitty stood to help Rebecca to her feet. Just then, a voice began echoing through the house.

"Kitty!" Robert shouted. "KITTY!" He shouted again, louder. She quickly turned towards his office and dashed down the hallway, finding him standing in front of his computer, staring down at the monitor. She could hear Rebecca coming, and as soon as the two women were in the doorway, Robert looked up at them. His face had gone pale and he didn't speak. All they could tell was that something was on the computer. They walked around his desk to see, and for both of them, it hit like an out-of-control bus hitting a brick wall.

Robert had received an e-mail containing a video recorded from an unknown location. Two men stood in the background, both wearing turbans and had dark faces. In front of them, on his knees, was Justin.

"Oh, God." Kitty said softly. Rebecca was trembling. Although it had barely been two and a half hours since he'd been taken, It seemed as if they were already far from Los Angeles. Justin was looking directly at the three of them through the video. His hands were behind his back, he was gagged with a black cloth, and it looked like he was already hurt. The right side of his face was all scraped up and bleeding around his ear. There was talking, but it wasn't in English. The men talked for a few moments, and a long window appeared at the bottom of the video screen. It looked like a timer, which was confirmed when it suddenly began counting backwards from approximately fourteen days.

"Who are those people?" Kitty asked silently.

"I believe they are militants from the desert in Iraq." Robert said. He'd seen videos like this before.

"It looks like a ransom video, almost." Rebecca said, supporting herself on the desk. Then, the three of them heard something going off. A cell phone.

"That's my phone." Kitty said. "I'll be right back." Once she moved, Rebecca moved closer to get a better look, despite it being very painful to look at. He was still wearing the suit he'd worn to dinner. She and Robert also looked at the time it was sent; barely twenty minutes earlier. A moment later, Kitty re-appeared in the doorway.

"Rebecca, are you calling me?"

"No." Rebecca answered. As soon as that word left her mouth, it hit her. If she had Justin's cell, than he must have hers.

"They have my cell." She said. Kitty looked at her cell phone, not sure on whether or not to answer it. Part of her wanted to answer it, hoping that maybe it was him telling them he had escaped or something. At the same time, she was terrified that it might be them.

"Give it to me, Kitty." Robert said, holding out his hand. Kitty hesitantly gave it to him, biting her nail afterwards. Robert slowly opened it up and pressed the call button. He held it to his ear.

"Hello?" He said in a soft voice.

There was just silence for a moment or two, then there was a weak voice.

"_Robert?"_

"Justin!" He exclaimed quietly. "Where are you, are you alright?"

"_Robert, please tell Kitty," _He said, taking deep, gasping breaths between sentences. _"Please tell them-no, wait-"_

"Justin?" Robert said louder. "Justin?"

"_Senator McAllister." _A man said with a thick Arabic accent.

"Speaking." Robert said, looking at Kitty and Rebecca.

"_I have your brother-in-law here, and he misses you greatly."_

"Where is he." Robert asked sternly.

"_That is not of your concern." _The man said. _"What is of your concern is your handling of this situation. If you or any other member of your family even attempts to contact any form of law enforcement involving this incident, it will result in his immediate death."_

Robert said nothing.

"_The clock on the video tells how much time he has left before our leader restores honor to his family name."_

With that statement, he knew perfectly well what was going on, and it horrified him. He could hear Justin in the background groaning in pain.

"_Robert?"_

"Justin!"

"_Tell them I love them and I'm sorry." _Justin said weakly, choking over his own words. _"Just please, please don't let them see, hear-"_

"Wait, Justin!" Robert barked.

"_Justin Walker is no longer any of your concern, Senator."_ The Arabic voice said once more. _"To help it sink in, we're going to give him something to help with the pain. Something like 48 or 49 volts-"_

Robert's eyes widened as he heard something warming up in the background, followed by Justin's voice.

"_Please don't-please don't make them listen-no-"_

Then there was a sharp noise, followed by a ear-piercing screen that jolted Robert so much that he impulsively jolted his hand, sending the phone falling to the desk. Both Kitty and Rebecca screamed when Justin had. Robert slowly reached fir the cell and put it back up to his ear. Nothing.

"Was that him?" Kitty asked, holding back her own tears now. "Please tell me that wasn't him."

Robert trembled a little bit, then looked back at the video on the computer screen. It had stopped, but the clock was still going. In reference to Kitty's question, he slowly nodded his head.

"What do they want?" She said angrily. Tears were now coming from her eyes and she was shaking harder.

"They don't want anything." Robert said. "This isn't for a ransom, it's for an execution."

To Be Continued…..


	5. Shattered

Chapter 5 – Shattered

Nora awoke dazed, puzzled over the memories flooding through her mind. Was it all a dream? She glanced around her bedroom. Everything was the way it had been the previous day, except now she noticed the still figure of her eldest daughter sleeping in the chair beside her bed. Sarah was hunched over the bed with her arms wrapped around a pillow. Nora pushed the heavy throw that had been laid over her and made her way over to Sarah. She gently shook her to wake her up. After a few shakes, Sarah slowly raised her head and looked into the sunlight shining in through the window. Her face looked haggard; red eyes and pale skin.

"Did I dream it?" Sarah asked quietly. Nora nodded her head from side to side.

"I was about to ask you the same question." She responded, lip quivering shortly afterwards.

"Oh, Mom." Sarah said as she took her mother into her arms, just moments before the sobbing started. It just drover Sarah out of her mind, the thought that something like this could have happened to someone like Justin. She had heard on the news these things before, but this seemed so much worse.

The previous night had been a living nightmare for the Walkers. Saul had come back from a road trip to Denver to visit Ida when he'd heard about Justin. From there he went straight to his sister's house, arriving there about the same time as the rest of the Walker pack. Apparently, the video that had been sent to Robert was also sent to Kevin's office computer, which had left him in such trauma Scotty almost had to bring him to the hospital because of his condition following the liver transplant. Sarah was thankful Paige and Cooper weren't around when the video somehow played itself on her laptop while she was taking a break from her work on Greenatopia earlier that night. Julia had stumbled across Tommy checking his e-mails that night when he found the video, and she got Elizabeth out of the room before she could recognize who was in it. After all of them met briefly at Kitty's house, they all frantically drove across the town packed into Sarah's van to get to their mother before she found it. They got there only minutes after she'd seen it. She'd become so hysterical that after a short period she just fainted. They all decided to stay the night. They felt they needed to be together.

Like Nora, Rebecca had also spent her energy in hysteria and had passed out shortly after Nora did. Holly had rushed all the way from the vineyard when Saul called her and told her the news. She sat by Rebecca all night long, barely sleeping a wink. Throughout the morning hours, long before sunrise, Tommy watched her sit in the dimly lit guest room through the slightly open door. He hadn't slept at all that night. Every time he almost dozed off, either on the staircase or at the island in the kitchen, he'd somehow be reminded of how terrible he'd been to Justin before. He had forgiven Justin verbally, but it felt now that he never had made amends. His mind was flooded with the thought of Justin dying thinking that his own brother hated him. It just about pushed him over the edge. When he'd watched his mom struggle with her emotions in such a violent way, it made him want to hold Elizabeth, feel thankful that he could still hold his child. Julia tried desperately to find somebody who could take the child for the night, but nobody could. Julia had tossed and turned all night, worrying about everything. When the morning finally came, she had one thing to be glad about. She looked at Elizabeth, sleeping in the crib Nora had set up in the room for when Elizabeth spent the night. Julia was thankful she was too young to understand what had happened. However, that thought just drew her back to Justin. He was there for her when she went into labor at the vineyard. She'd delivered both of the twins. It had still hurt to lose their son, but she knew if Justin hadn't been there, she and Tommy could have lost both of them. As she laid in the quiet, she saw the sunshine coming in through the blinds. Her hand went directly to the golden cross she'd worn for five years, since Tommy had given it to her for their first wedding anniversary. She prayed for him.

Scotty had barely slept the night either, which was pretty rough considering he'd taken three sleeping pills. Kevin hadn't said very much, and had actually slept soundly. However, he'd been talking in his sleep most of the night, and mentioned his brother's name several times. At first, Scotty thought about how if this was truly happening, how much he would miss Justin. He loved the fact that all of Kevin's family had taken to him so well, but the way Justin had accepted him into the family made him feel so bad thinking of how he must be suffering at that point in time. He thought of the morning two days after he and Kevin had gotten married. Justin stopped at their apartment at around 5 in the morning with a brand new surfboard for him. It had the same pattern as Kevin's did, only in different colors. Justin helped him catch his first wave that morning. Surfing was a Walker tradition for Justin. He'd told Scotty about how he'd welcomed each member of the family in by surfing. First it was with Joe, and even though he and Sarah were divorced, he still let Joe keep the surfboard with the black guitar on it. When Julia came into the family, he took both her and Tommy surfing after they had gotten married, and she liked it so much that on their honeymoon in Hawaii, she was at one point catching better waves than Tommy. Robert hadn't taken to surfing very well, considering he was more into sports like hunting and hockey. He did admit Robert had gotten better. He still wasn't that good, but was still better than Kitty. He had been there when Justin helped Paige catch her first small wave, and he had planned to teach Cooper and further down the line, Elizabeth. Scotty checked on Kevin once more, then tried to close his eyes and get some sleep, praying this was all just a bad dream.

Kitty was sitting out on the sundeck, near the pool. She had barely slept all night either and had actually sat by the pool all night long. She was sitting on the edge of the sauna, near the diving board. It was at that spot whereas Justin and Tommy had frantically tried to save their father when he had his heart attack. She could almost see the figure of Justin, sopping wet, pounding his palms into his father's chest, trying to revive him. When they had gotten the word that William had passed away, Kitty remembers that as being the first time she'd seen Justin cry in the longest time. The thought of never seeing him again made her feel dead inside. She'd been praying most of the night.

"_I know I haven't spoken to you in a while, but I really do need you now. My brother needs you, because now he's suffering because of somebody else's ill doings. I know I have not been very faithful to you, but I still love you, and I believe you are real. If you could do this for me, I'd love you even more. All I want is to know where my brother is. Amen."_

Kitty said her prayer in silence before dipping her toes in the waters where her father had spent the last moments of his life. Deep down, she wished he was there. He'd know what to do. As she prayed, she also prepared herself. She asked that if it really was Justin's time to leave the world, that he be taken care of by their dad. With that thought, all she could do was cry some more. All the Walkers felt totally helpless. Justin's time was running out.

Justin was far away from the rest of his family, clear across the world. After being shot with three tazers at once, the men who had taken him from Pasadena injected him with heavy doses of morphine. When he woke up, he was tied up inside of a wooden crate with the dimensions of a coffin. He was still wearing the suit he'd worn to dinner with Rebecca. Finally after several hours, the crate was opened and he was dumped out onto a concrete floor. His vision was blurred after being blindfolded for almost 12 hours, but once his vision came back, he was startled to be looking into the eyes of that same man who'd made a move on his life 18 months earlier. He was wearing the same black robe with the same red band around his forehead, and the same black feathers with the stones on the strings were hanging from the headband. The man's face was filled with rage, but he seemed to be content with his anger. Within a split second. He picked Justin up by the shirt collar and held him up almost to eye level.

"You've caused us all a heavy debt." The man said in his thick accent. "Now you will pay with your life."

Within the blink of an eye, the man thrust his knee into Justin's stomach, knocking the air out of his lungs before releasing him and letting him fall to the ground. He coughed heavily for a few moments, recoiling from the pain.

"Tell me something, Justin." Rabu said with a more understandable tone of voice. "You have a rather large family back in America, don't you?"

After a moment of pausing from the pain in his stomach, Justin slowly nodded yes.

"Yes, quite the family indeed. Your mother, two brothers and two sisters, three of which have spouses, and two of which have children, soon to be three I hear."

"Yes, I do." Justin answered in a hoarse voice.

"It is a shame that you cannot see them." Rabu said. "However, they will soon be able to see you." Justin's eyes widened when he saw Rabu step aside an reveal a camcorder mounted on a stand. As soon as he saw it, he slowly closed his eyes and rested his head on the ground. It was just too much. As he did that. He felt a sharp pain on his back as Rabu began to press his foot into his back.

"Now your family will know the pain my family suffered when you took my brother's life." Rabu said, pulling his foot away. "And once my brother's name is restored it's honor, your name will be wiped from the world." After that, Justin kept his eyes on Rabu as he and two other men took the camera and walked out of the room he was in. The lights were cut, and he was left in the dark. He heard a car motor start up and drive away. He remembered the smell of the desert, which assured him he was back in Iraq. He'd seen canisters of things and stuff that had labels printed in the language. Now the light was gone and the noise was gone. He was alone in silence and darkness. At one moment, he felt around in the tail of his coat, which hung down by where his hands were bound together behind his back. He could feel the small box which held Rebecca's ring. It was still there in his pocket. It made him think of her, of all of them. He could already feel his energy draining, he prayed for his family. It wasn't the most traditional prayer, but it was his highest concern.

"_Please don't let them see me die, please, please don't let her see me die."_

To be continued…..


	6. Witness

Chapter 6 – Witness

Four days had passed and he'd fully accepted that help wasn't coming. He was able to understand some of the dialect when they had made the videos to send to his family. He knew a bit more about where he was being held. It was some kind of small storehouse made with cinderblock walls. He could tell because he'd been thrown against them several times. He'd dislocated his left shoulder at least twice, both times somebody had popped it back into place. His worst injury had been when he'd been shot in the knee, the same knee that he'd injured the year before. It had gone completely through his knee and pierced a box of nails on the shelf on the adjoining wall. They'd bandaged his knee up. They'd given him small injections of morphine to dull the pain, but it wasn't enough to make it go away altogether. He knew what they were doing, because he'd heard of it happening before. This was how some of the desert tribes carried out honor killings-slowly and painfully.

That morning, one of the tribesmen had beaten him over the legs with a wooden spar, only getting muffled grunts in response from Justin. He'd clench his teeth and slam his eyes shut and bear through the pain, no matter how hard it was. He'd done it plenty of times before. The man in the red ragged clothing circled him a few times, listening to his heavy breathing. He had at least two broken ribs and his face was pretty scratched up, so he tried to avoid moving as much as he could.

"Why don't you scream out like the others?" The man asked.

"I don't do that." Justin responded.

"So, It will be a challenge, then?" The man said again, turning to the wooden planked door and exiting the room. He listened to them lock the door with a padlock, then could hear them talking outside.

"_This one seems a tad more resilient to pain." _One voice said.

"_Well, I know how we can fix that." _Another voice said._ "No morphine today, let the pain break him down, just like it did to all the others."_

With that, they left the area, leaving him in the silence. It was still daylight out because he could see the sunlight shining through the cracks in the corrugated metal roof. Once he knew they were gone, Justin rolled over onto his stomach, a bit harder than he had planned to because he gave off two sharp grunts as he landed on his chest. He held his breath for a few moments before the pain finally subsided. He was in a bit more pain then he had been in while laying on his side, but now he could finally rest his head flatly. As he rested, he didn't notice four eyes looking at him from behind, through a hole in the wall.

"_Is it an American?" _One girl whispered silently in almost perfect English

"_I believe so." _The other girl whispered, also in English._ "He's hurt really bad."_

"_Oh no!" _The first girl said._ "They're going to do it again." _The two girls looked out at their beautiful desert, now filled with the bones of men from foreign lands. They both knew the truth about what had happened in the war. Both had lost their entire families in the fighting and now lived in a small orphanage in the village.

"_I think we should-"_ The first girl began, before suddenly going silent.

"_Jadia?"_ The other girl asked.

"_It-it can't be!" _Jadia gasped as she looked closer at the wounded American's hands tied behind his back. Near the bindings was a very familiar looking cross hanging from a leather strand tied around his wrist. Also, as she had watched the fighting, she saw what looked like two dog tags fly from around his neck and land in the gap between two shelves, right in front of her. She could see them laying in the dust in front of her. She slowly reached her hand out for the chain, grasping it with two fingers and slowly dragging it over. When she looked at it in the sunlight, she saw it was pretty scratched up. The one thing she could make out was the name- Justin Walker. She quickly but silently fished around in her pockets for something, and she pulled out a dog tag similar to the one she had just found. She looked at the two side by side, and they were identical.

"_It's him!" _She whispered.

"_Who?"_

"_The soldier who saved me!" _Jadia told her friend. "_He was a medic!"_

Jadia stood up from her place by the wall and motioned for them to leave. _"Come, it isn't safe to be here now. We will come back later."_

After the sun had gone down and the moon and stars rose, the two girls set out again, flashlight in hand, to the stone house near the camp of the desert tribe. The two girls were familiar with their operations. The tribe had lived in the area and had been terrorizing the local villagers, mostly attacking Shiite villages and farms. Any soldier, regardless of his ethnicity or religion, paid the price for getting in their way. About five miles north of their village, the girls saw the wooden post with the red cloth wrapped around it, warning outsiders to stay away. They crept down behind a sand dune and went past the camp, until they saw the dark shadow of the stone building. It was well hidden in the sand dunes, even a plane wouldn't be able to see it until they were right over it. The girls crept over to the hole behind the wooden crate, and they slowly and carefully removed the loose blocks, creating a hole large enough for each girl to fit through. Once inside, Jadia turned on her flashlight but kept it pointed to the floor, so nobody who might be outside would see the light. Jadia and her friend crept over to the still figure in the center of the room. They both kneeled next to him and Jadia reached out her hand to shake his shoulder. She barely touched him when he suddenly inhaled sharply and impulsively rolled onto his side again, facing the two girls. He blinked wildly as his eyes adjusted, and he looked up to see two young girls, roughly twelve or thirteen years old.

"Do you remember me?" Jadia asked. Justin looked at her closely, trying to see if he remembered her. While he was here, he'd seen a lot of young girls, but after a few moments, he did recognize her. "Aren't you that girl from the village?" He asked. "Jadia?"

"Yes, that is me." She said. He cracked a weak smile at her presence. "It's good to see you, you've sure grown." He was right, she had grown almost four inches since that day that he snatched her out of the way of that jeep.

"Come on," Jadia said, pulling a small knife from her pocket. "We can get you out of here. There's a hole in the wall you can fit through, and our village isn't that far away."

"Wait, stop!" Justin said softly and quickly, just before she cut the cords binding his wrists together. "I can't make it."

"Jadia, he's bleeding!" Her friend said with a gasp as she took her own flashlight and looked at the small puddle of blood around his right knee. It was then the two girls realized how badly hurt he really was, and it made Justin feel nervous having two young kids see him like that. He'd never be able to make it across the desert in time, and it would be morning soon. "Sabriya, what should we do?" Jadia asked her friend.

"There is something you can do to help me." Justin said. Jadia listened tentatively. "My wallet is in my right pocket, could you please take it and send it to my family?" He asked. Jadia carefully reached into his pocket and pulled out a black leather wallet. "My mother's address is on my driver's license, it will be the first thing you see when you open it." Jadia nodded and put the wallet into her own pocket. Her friend pulled a bottle of water out of her own bag and gave Justin a drink of it. "Wait, there's something else." He said, moving his hand gently to feel the box in his pocket. "In the pocket of my coat, by where my left hand is, there's a small box with a ring inside of it. I want you to send that to my mother as well." Justin noticed something else about the girls. Both of them were dressed in tattered clothes and he had something else that could help them. "One more thing." He added. The two girls looked up at him.

"In my wallet there's a green plastic card that I've saved for an emergency. The passcode is written on the back, and there's quite a bit of money on it. I want you to have it." The two girls gasped. "Also, don't go to anybody from the military with this." He said once more. "I don't want them involved in this."

Both girls nodded slowly.

"Now I need you to go." Justin told them. "Get somewhere safe, please."

"But, Justin-"

"Please." He begged, looking Jadia right in the eye. She'd seen this before. Her father had the same look before he died. His last thought was for her well being, and it was considered by their people a very honorable thing to do. She nodded once more and they left, replacing the blocks in the hole in the wall and walked away, leaving him in the dark. Sabriya cried silently, thinking how awful it was and astounded at hoe brave he was being. She'd never seen that before. After a moment, she turned to ask Jadia something, and noticed that Jadia was walking the other way. She ran to Jadia, asking her where she was going.

"I know of an Uncle who lives in Damascus." She said, looking through Justin's wallet. She found the green card. It was a cash card. "He can help me get there."

"Where?" Sabriya asked.

"A place called Pasadena." Jadia answered. "We can't help him, but I think we can reach somebody who can." Sabriya followed her for a moment, listening.

"He hasn't been there very long, and they probably aren't going to try to kill him off for at least another week." Jadia stated as they walked over the sand dunes. This stopped Sabriya dead in her tracks. "You're going all the way to America?"

"Yes." She answered. "I owe him my life, so I must try!" Sabriya stopped for a moment. They both had everything they owned in their knapsacks, which they carried with them always out of instinct.

"I'm coming with you." Sabriya said. I do believe I have some family living in Syria. Many orphans from Iraq had distant relatives living in other Arab nations who had fled the war. They both knew of a road about two miles to the north where they could fin a bus headed west to Syria. They could get passports with assistance from the government if they could prove they were going to America to go to school. There was a program they had heard about in Syria which sent schoolchildren to other countries, including the United States, for schooling. They didn't have to go for long, just long enough to find Justin's family and tell them where he was, and how they could be his last hope.

To Be Continued…..


	7. Finding Strength

Chapter 7 – Finding Strength

Seven days passed without a word over the unthinkable predicament Justin Walker now found himself in. Nora had barely left the house and her co-workers on the safe haven she as trying to build became worried. The phone had rung with their numbers on the caller ID were ringing at least four times a day. She felt numb, unable to face the world, a world without him. It was different from when she had lost William. Since her husband's death she had scorned his name so many times she didn't have time to feel in shock. Losing Justin, she knew, would bring her world to its knees.

The Walker children weren't doing much better. Because there had been five of them for so long, the thought of there being only four of them left was too hard to even imagine. Kitty hadn't answered any of the letters regarding her book, Kevin could barely focus on his work, and Scotty had almost filed his hand open in the kitchen three times in one day. Julia had sent for her parents to come and pick up Elizabeth while she and Tommy figured out how to handle this. Sarah spent sleepless night after sleepless night watching home movies and pondering how she would explain this to Paige and Cooper, and Rebecca was in the worst shape of all. She had barely eaten anything or slept at all in the week that he'd been gone. Holly had brought her into the hospital three times, and every time she was sent home and ordered to rest. But how could she rest? The man she loved was running out of time in his life and there wasn't anything they could do. Or so they thought.

LAX was reaching it's peak busy hour when Jadia and Sabriya, both exhausted and pawing over maps of Los Angeles, arrived. They had reached their extended families in Syria and gained enough funds to first fly from Damascus to Athens in a seaplane, then from Athens to Gibraltar in another seaplane. From there they took a bus to Madrid, and from there a 747 to Mexico City. They had their papers and everything done and with them and after they were processed, took one last plane from Mexico City to Los Angeles, all in 2 Days, 15 Hours, and 39 Minutes. They were coming to go to school, and had been accepted into the program and placed under the care of a "friend of the family", Ms. Nora Walker. Now they just needed to find where she lived. They laid the map out on the floor and kneeled down to quickly find Pasadena on the map. The trip had exposed them to a lot of new things. With the money Justin had given them, they paid for their trip and bought themselves each new clothes so they wouldn't be identified as runaways. They had cash on their hands and could both read and write in English, thanks to the American-run orphanage they had lived in.

"Okay, all we must do is ask a taxi driver to bring us to her address." Sabriya looked up and saw a row of yellow cars with the English word "TAXI" on the top, and they both took off, towing their duffels behind them.

"Come on, Rebecca." Kitty pleaded, practically burning her hands with a hot cup of soup. "You've barely eaten anything in days."

Rebecca sat slouched over the counter at the island in Nora's kitchen. She was wearing the pajamas she'd been wearing for three days straight.

"I'm sorry," She started, yawning. "The thought of food right now just makes me sick to my stomach." As Rebecca looked up she could see how haggard Kitty was, her hair hadn't been combed in days and she had deep circles under her eyes.

"But I guess I'll try." She said, taking the soup. Nora walked past her, still as pale as ever. She was up and dressed in clean clothes, which was at least one good sign. However, the thought that they couldn't do a single thing to help Justin was proving to be too much for her. Just as she began to open the refrigerator, she heard the doorbell ring from the front door.

"I'll get it." She sighed. She'd barely spoken to a person she wasn't related to. She remembered that feeling she got in the pit of her stomach every time the doorbell or the phone rang, worrying about whether or not it was somebody telling this mother of five she had now become a mother of four. As she looked through the peek hole, she saw two small figures, two children at her door.

"_Probably Girl Scouts." _Nora thought to herself, reaching for her purse by the door. She hated shooing them away so fast when they were probably raising money for an animal shelter or summer camp. She opened the door and looked at the two girls.

"Hello, can I help you?" Nora said to the girls, forcing herself to be polite.

"Ms. Walker?" Asked one of the girls in an accent. "Nora Walker?"

"Yes, that's me." Both girls sighed in relief.

"Thank goodness!" The other girl said with a sigh. "We've been looking for you."

Nora paused for a moment, her irritation building up as their mood towards her presence didn't seem appropriate considering the circumstances her family now found themselves in. She's almost forgotten that they probably didn't know what was going on.

"I'm terribly sorry girls, but I've already bought more than my fair share of cookies." She said, setting her purse back on the table next to the doorway.

"Ms. Walker?" The first girl asked worriedly.

"You could probably try down the street."

"but, wait-"

"Bye, now." Nora began closing the door.

"But we know where your son is!" Jadia suddenly blurted out.

Nora stopped dead in her tracks, slowly opening the door. She took a deep breath, unable to speak.

"He is alive, Ms. Walker." Sabriya said. "But he needs help soon."

Nora still couldn't speak, she was on the verge of having another breakdown when she finally found the strength to talk. "Please, come in." She said softly as she opened the door. They both stepped in, immediately focusing their eyes on the pictures hanging on the stairwell. The pictures along the curved wall stood out in their minds, as one of the faces within many of the photos looked very familiar, in a way they had wished they had seen him in instead of the way they really had.

"You know where Justin is?" Nora asked again, hopefully and in a slightly louder tone of voice. Neither girl spoke. Jadia simply lifted her arm to show a very familiar looking metal object hanging from her wrist. It was Justin's dog tags. Nora remembered that since enlisting, he'd hardly ever taken them off. Sabriya then reached into her pocket and pulled out Justin's wallet and the ring box, still wondering who the ring was for.

"Mom?" A woman's voice echoed from the Kitchen. Kitty arrived in the foyer just in time to see the tags, which stopped her in her tracks.

"Those-" Kitty started. "A-Are those?"

"Yes." Nora answered. They both turned to the girls. "Who are you?" Nora asked firmly.

"I am Jadia, and this is Sabriya." Jadia said, introducing herself and her friend. "We are from Iraq."

Kitty's eyes widened. "Iraq?"

"You came all this way by yourselves?" Nora said in her maternal worrying voice. "Your parents must be worried sick."

"Our parents are dead." Jadia said as they both slightly lowered their heads. "In the war."

Both women gasped.

"You see, Ms. Walker-" Jadia began.

"Please call me Nora." Nora insisted.

"Nora." Jadia corrected herself. "When your son was in Iraq last year he pulled me out of the way of a speeding jeep when the Sunni militants attacked our village. He saved my life and he and his unit killed many of the attackers. One of those he killed was one of their leaders."

Nora and Kitty heard Rebecca coming down the hall and saw her join them.

"He is responsible for what has happened." Jadia finished. Nora turned to Rebecca to introduce the girls. When Rebecca heard where they were from, Kitty automatically noticed her eyes light up just the slightest bit. She saw hope.

"I saw them." Rebecca stated in her normal tone of voice. "I was there when he took them." She hurt deeply inside as she forced herself to remember the last time she's seen him, the last time they had been together.

"Those men were from one of the most feared militant groups in the Arab world." Sabriya informed them. The army has been hunting them down for years and their numbers are dwindling, but some of the more powerful branches still remain. Many troops have died under their hands, including several Americans." Jadia said. Nora tried to take in all this information as best she could, as did Kitty and Rebecca.

"Here, let's sit down." Nora said as she led everybody into the living room. She and Kitty and Rebecca sat on the couch while the two girls both easily squeezed into one armchair. "We know what they have planned for Justin." Jadia continued. "We've heard of honor killings before, but they are almost impossible to catch in time to do anything in time to do anything about it. It's a miracle we found Justin in time."

"We tried to help him out," Sabriya said, almost tearing up. "He was hurt so badly that he couldn't be moved without more help."

"He was acting very bravely." Jadia said. "That is something very honorable to our people."

"Why couldn't you find help in Iraq?" Kitty asked.

"Those militants could hear a fish jumping a rock in the Sea of Japan and race there in enough time to catch it before it re-entered the water." Jadia answered with a colorful metaphor. "He'd be dead before we could have reached him."

There was nothing said for a few moments, than Jadia continued to speak.

"This is why we have com here." That was all she said before letting the three women think about it. After a few moments, Kitty figured it out.

"We have to save him?" She blurted out. Nora's eyes widened and Rebecca bit her lip as Jadia and Sabriya looked at them nervously.

"It's the only way." Jadia said. "Or else he's doomed."

Kitty stood up and slowly paced the living room, trying desperately to ingest what she'd just heard come from her own mouth. Sabriya looked at her friend, then suddenly remembered the ring. "Are you Justin's wife? She asked.

Rebecca seemed startled by her question. "No, I'm just his girlfriend."

Sabriya stood up and walked over to her. "He gave this to us, and I believe that he meant it to be for you."

Rebecca looked at her in a small dose of shock when she slowly took the ring box from her. She recognized the label of the store on the box, and as soon as she opened the box, she stopped breathing for a long moment. She looked at the stones, the blue jewel, she read the message. A single tear rolled down her cheek. Kitty gasped loudly when she saw it for the first time. "Oh, Rebecca." Nora said in the same tone.

Rebecca looked at that ring and remembered that those two girls had just told them. That ring was made as if it had come right from his heart. It was as if his love had been made into a physical object. It also symbolized the courage and strength he had in loving her and in taking on life and the troubles in the world, levels that matched her own.

"Nora?"

Nora looked at Rebecca and was taken back by the look on Rebecca's face. Her color had returned, the circles under her eyes were gone, and her stomach was growling like a wild lion.

"When can we leave?"

To Be Continued…..


	8. Half Dead

Chapter 8 – Half Dead

The sun was beginning to set at the end of the seventh day. Justin had been slopping in and out of consciousness for the past hour or so when he'd been picked up and fling over a large person's shoulder. A strip of dark cloth had been tied around his eyes, but the rest of his body was now covered with sunburns after the band had left him laying against a metal surface for most of the day. Although somebody had periodically splashed him with cold water, it had still been extremely painful, a pain which was pushed to the maximum level when he was simply thrown back into his cinderblock prison. As soon as he hit the ground hard, he heard the door slam shut behind him and the lock click.

He was glad to be out of the sun, but now the cool air inside the shack made his skin sting even worse. On his face, the dried blood from the long gash running down the right side of his hairline was now mixing with the sweat that now drenched his torn and soiled clothes. His jacket was gone; somebody had cut it off of him, and his shirt had been ripped in the front and the tail from him being thrown against the wall so many times. He could feel he had two broken ribs, and two more were dislocated, which luckily enough for him didn't affect his breathing too much. His right knee was also wrenched out of place, but the pain had mysteriously dulled off of that, and now he could barely feel his right leg from the knee down. He could still move his foot, but it hurt too badly for him to. He could tell these men knew what they were doing, and that they had done it before, because they hadn't done anything life-threatening to him, nothing that would have sent him into cardiac arrest or cause him to bleed to death. The pain was endless, and there was nothing he could do about it. To make matters worse, he could hear a camera beep every few minutes or so, which told him this was being recorded and that any number of his family could be watching him right now, the thought of which alone almost killed him. He could feel his energy draining and knew he'd be unconscious soon, so he spoke to the only person he thought could help him.

_"God please," _He pleaded silently, choking over his own words. _"Please don't let them see me die, please don't let her see me die."_

Two moments later, he slipped into unconsciousness, his head thudding silently against the concrete floor.

_He dreamed that night of his family. They were laying him to rest in Pinedale Cemetery, beside his father. He could see the soft marble headstone reading his name._

JUSTIN WALTER WALKER

NOVEMBER 18, 1979 – FEBRUARY 3, 2009

_He saw his mom, Uncle Saul standing beside her with his arm around her shoulder. It looked as if she could barely stand up. Kitty was sobbing uncontrollably, burying her face into Robert's shoulder. She couldn't bear to watch them bury her brother. Sarah stood nearby, grasping a red rose tightly in her hand. He guessed the florist had missed a thorn, because her hand was bleeding from the palm. She didn't care-or even notice, but continued to sob silently, her body jerking forward just slightly every moment or two. She stood by herself; Paige and Cooper were nowhere in sight, but the two letters resting on top of the casket told him they had been stricken with the horrible news. One had his name written on it in brown crayon, and the other was from Paige. She'd drawn an American flag on the envelope and tried to write his name in the best cursive she could, but the three or four drops of what he knew had to have been her tears told him it was among the worst things any 12-year-old would have to face._

_Tommy was there, Julia beside him. Her eyes were red from crying, far more than they had been at his father's funeral. The look on Tommy's face told him his death had left his eldest brother a broken man. His face was pale, his eyes discolored. He stood like a statue, unable to move or speak. It looked almost like he was afraid to. Kevin was at the podium next to the casket, and was giving the eulogy. He couldn't make out what he was saying, but the pale look on his face told him it was heart-wrenching, even for Kevin. Scotty stood in the front row, not moving, just staring at Kevin. Both of them had lost a brother they loved, and his look of shock and grief matched that of Kevin's. _

_Last but not least, he saw Rebecca. She looked so pale that he thought she looked like a ghost. Her mom was there too, Holly wiping her eyes and whispering softly to the adjoining grave,_

"_Please look over him, William."_

_At that moment, Justin wished more than ever that he could talk to his father, that William Walker was there with him. But he wasn't. nobody was. _

In a quick snap, Justin's eyes snapped open from his dream. He was back in the stone hut, the scent of the sands of the desert coming back to him. It was dark, except for the moon shining in through the cracks in the roof. At that moment he wished he was dead. He wished it was over. He hated thinking like that, but it didn't seem like he had very much of a choice.

To Be Continued…..


	9. United Front

Chapter 9 – United

Later that afternoon, Saul paid his sister a visit. When he arrived, the house was dark, and the driveway was void of cars – everybody was gone.

"Nora!" He called into the empty house as he walked through the front door. All the lights were off and the house was still. However, he did hear something that sounded like rummaging around coming from Nora's bedroom towards the back of the first floor. As he approached the back hallway to her bedroom, he saw the two hallway closets looked like they'd exploded; both doors were open and their contents were spilled all over the floor. He carefully stepped over Tupperware containers, Christmas decorations, and camping equipment as he walked towards the end of the hall. He saw her light was on, and when he entered the doorway, he saw her rolling things up into a small knapsack with her late husband's name on it.

"Nora, what are you doing?" He asked. She jumped slightly at the sound of his voice, looking up at her brother. She didn't answer him for a few moments. She simply walked over to him and hugged him. As she pulled away from him, she looked him square in the eye in a way that made the hairs on his neck stand on end.

"I'm going to go get my son."

Saul paused for a moment in shock. "You're going where?"

"You heard me." She said, closing William's old knapsack. "Robert has been on his phone for hours talking with some Air Force base in Nevada where he's got an old plane he bought a few years ago."

"I can't believe this." Saul said, rubbing his forehead. "You're actually going to Iraq?"

"What choice do I have?" Nora snapped. "I won't just sit back and let my boy die."

"Alright, alright." He answered, trying to calm her down. She settled her nerves then looked at her brother with a gentle, but firm face.

"I need to get going." She said softly, picking up her knapsack and glancing at herself in the mirror. She'd found William's old leather jacket in the closet. She had been sure it had all gone to the Salvation Army after he'd passed, but she was glad she'd left it. He'd worn it when he'd gone off to fight in Korea, and Justin had taken it with him when he was in Afghanistan. It fit her nicely, except for the fact that her shoulders weren't as broad as her husband's or her son's. As she turned to leave, not planning to say much more to Saul, he turned to her.

"I know you'll find him." He reassured her.

She left him there in the house, leaving him the keys. He admired her for being so brave, but at the same time was terrified at the fact that he may never see her again.

After stopping at Joe's to see Paige and Cooper, Sarah stopped at Rebecca's apartment. She stayed in her car as she watched Holly stand at the door talking to Rebecca. Rebecca had changed into a long sleeved green shirt and was wearing what looked very familiar to Sarah. It was a piece of Justin's old uniform that he'd worn in Afghanistan. It was a camouflage vest made full of pockets and the name badge reading "Walker" on the left shoulder. She stood and talked to her mom for a few minutes.

"Becca, this is why I truly believed William was your father." Rebecca was puzzled by her mother's statement.

"You're very brave and very ambitious, just like he was."

"Oh, Mom-" Rebecca began before Holly wrapped her arms around her daughter and held her tightly.

"You'll be fine, and you'll find him." Holly reassured her daughter. "If there's anyone who knows how to be brave like him, it's you."

Rebecca quickly returned the hug and turned to Sarah's van. "Go on." Holly whispered, trying to hold back the tears as she watched Rebecca climb into Sarah's van. As they drove away, Rebecca turned to Sarah.

"Are you ready for this?" Rebecca asked.

"I've been ready for this for twenty-nine years." She answered. "I remember being twelve years old and seeing Justin for the first time." Rebecca leaned back into her seat and listened to Sarah. She loved listening to her and the others telling these stories. She'd looked at all the photo albums and scrapbooks. "I promised him something." Sarah continued. "The very same promise I'd given to Kitty, then Tommy, and Kevin." She paused for a moment, looking at the sunset over the Pacific ocean as she made her way to Kitty's house. She was trying very hard not to start tearing up. "I promised him that if he was ever in trouble, or if he needed help, that I would be there for him, that I would never let him down." She looked back at Rebecca and noticed her face looking a little gloomy.

"Did I ever tell you the story of how Justin conquered his fear of the dark?"

"No."

"Oh, it's a good one." Sarah continued. "I was sixteen years old, stuck babysitting him and Kevin. My dad was on a business trip, Mom had gone overnight to one of Tommy's football games in San Diego, and Kitty was in Florida doing something for this student politics organization she was in. Kevin was already sound asleep and I was watching TV, and he came in, he was about eight or nine and was scared to death, because his guitar nightlight had been broken and mom hadn't found him another yet. He asked if he could sleep in the living room. That's when I told him the secret to conquering fears."

"You taught him that?" Rebecca asked. "He's mentioned this technique before."

"Yeah." Sarah Responded. "I told him that if you run away from your fears, they get bigger and bigger until you can't get away from them anymore. So, what he does is he goes back to his room, and I didn't hear from him until the next morning. He said he'd still been scared, but he'd just accepted it."

"Yeah, I remember him telling me that when they sent him back to Iraq." Rebecca said. "Fear is the first step to conquering the problems we face in the world." She thought of how she'd moved in with Nora and helped her through the time away from Justin. "It really worked well."

After Sarah turned the next corner and stopped at a red light, she noticed Rebecca was now looking at the ring.

"You aren't going to put it on?"

"No." Rebecca answered. "I'll wait until he can put it on my finger himself."

Julia sat in her home office, terrified at what she was seeing. The video of Justin sent by the militants couldn't be tracked. Even though she had a degree in Computer Science, she just couldn't hack it. After ignoring it for a few moments, she began to watch it and it really hit her at that moment the level of pain he was in. She could see he was trying to hide it, a common trait she'd seen amongst the Walker men. When she looked at Justin, it broke her heart thinking that this was happening to him. She remembered when Tommy first proposed to her and she'd said yes, Justin was the first to give her one of those great big Walker hugs she'd grown to love so much. How she and Sarah always tried to teach him how to cook, and how to work a fire extinguisher, just like they had attempted to do many times with Kitty. Then she remembered the first time she'd seen his bravery. When they were at the opening for Walker Landing and she'd gone into Labor. He looked her square in the eye and told her he wasn't going to leave her, just as Tommy had. He helped her through the pain of giving birth without any drugs. She's seen the scar Sarah gave Joe when Paige was born, and then both the scars she'd given him when Cooper was born, and worried about it right up until the birth. As she had held his hand in one, Tommy's in the other, both hands were as hard as stone, just as she really needed them to be. It made her really upset, then angry that she wasn't there with him helping him out of that pain he was in. At that moment, she stood from her desk and marched into the bedroom, where Tommy was packing. He only had one bag packed from his hunting gear. "What are you doing?" He asked as she grabbed her backpack, dumped all of her papers and folders from work on the bed, and began shoving a few pieces of clothing into it.

"I'm coming with you."

"What?" Tommy said. "You can't go, what about Elizabeth?"

"I called my parents and they are taking her for a few more days in Phoenix."

"Julia, I can't focus on helping my brother if I know you're in danger as well."

"Tommy, I have to do this."

"Have to?"

"Yes. I owe him." Julia said, coming close to tearing up. "We both owe him."

Tommy could automatically tell what she was talking about. Julia rested herself on the dresser with one arm and put her hand over her eyes with the other, trying to gather herself together. She couldn't be losing it now.

"It was hard losing our son. We both know that." She said, clearing her throat. "If it hadn't been for him, we would have lost her too."

Tommy sat there motionless on the bed, staring at her. He knew she was right. It made him upset thinking that he hadn't been the greatest older brother to Justin lately, and if Justin didn't make it he'd have to live with that forever. How could he face Elizabeth in her life knowing that the man responsible for her being alive died and he had let that man, her own uncle, die when they were at such bad ends. Now he almost started tearing up as Julia gave him a hug. He cried into her shirt, very hard. In all the years she'd known him, the number of times she'd seen him cry was few. She also wanted to do this for Tommy. She wanted to be there at his side as well. For better or worse meant both better _and _worse, after all.

Kevin was packing a few things together when he looked at the picture of him and his three brothers tacked on the tack board in His and Scotty's room. It was the first time he'd looked at it since Justin disappeared, and it wasn't until that time that he realized how much he missed Justin. His childish jokes, funny comments, times they'd shared that made him laugh so hard that if he wouldn't blow out his stitches, he would be laughing about right now. Scotty quickly rushed in, his bag over his shoulder.

"Hurry up, your mom is here!" He barked. Kevin zipped up his bag and grabbed his coat as they went to meet his mother.

"Wow, it's like a party for the mouth!" Jadia exclaimed as she and Sabriya devoured an entire frozen pizza Kitty had made them while Robert was still on the phone with the head sergeant for his old Air Force base. Kitty had watched the two girls for the afternoon while Nora prepared for the trip. The whole afternoon she had thought about Justin. She had heard of how kidnappings in the Middle East had gone through before and that just made her even more nervous. She left the girls in the Kitchen to enjoy their first pizza while she walked back into Robert's office. He was finally off the phone, and had worked up a sweat.

"Well, we are all set." Robert said. "I talked to the head general of the base and they are going to keep our operations classified for the time being. Once we have made it to Justin I'll have them send it along to the offices at the Department of Defense."

"Kitty blinked in amazement. "Is this even legal?"

"Just barely."

"Wow." Kitty said, crossing her arms. She walked around his desk to look at the video, which had been open on his computer since it had been received. The girls had looked at it and said that was definitely where they had found him. They were just lucky the camera had been off when they were there. Kitty was surprised to see that seeing such a gruesome sight didn't seem to impact them as much as it had her.

"Kitty, they have been watching the war up close their whole lives." Robert told her, resting his hand on her shoulder. "I'll bet they're probably used to it."

"Yeah, I know that they are." Kitty said silently, looking out the window up at the first star she saw. "Those girls are the angels I prayed for."

Robert looked at her for a moment, then left her to pack. He understood what she was talking about.

Kitty looked up at the stars, closed her eyes, and whispered gently.

"_Thank You."_

She saw Jadia and Sabriya as gifts from God's hands. She believed he had sent Jadia and Sabriya to find them in response to her prayer. Her prayers had been answered. She finally knew where he was, after so many days of what seemed like an eternity. She was reminded of both of his deploys with the military to the Middle East, how she'd chewed her fingernails down, spent so many sleepless nights wondering if she'd ever see him again, and worrying about where he was. That was a gift to her directly from God. Now she knew where he was. The next step was getting to him.

To Be Continued…..


	10. Eleven Hours

Chapter 10 – Eleven Hours

After almost 10 hours of driving, the Walker family arrived at Goldfield Air Force Base near Goldfield, Nevada. Nora drove her SUV carrying Kevin, Scotty, and Robert. Sarah drove in her van, carrying with her Rebecca, Julia, Tommy, Kitty, Jadia, and Sabriya. It was the morning of the eighth day when they arrived. Robert had his laptop and was monitoring Justin on the video, which was still running. Nora couldn't bear to look at it and focused on the road all night long. Kevin and Scotty, however, did get a good look at how rapidly Justin's condition was worsening. After a while, Robert eventually closed the window.

Meanwhile, Sarah's van was a bit more packed full of people. Rebecca had fallen asleep and rested her head on the window in the front seat. In the far back, Tommy was slouched back with his arms around Julia, who was fast asleep. Tommy had kept his eyes on the stars all night long. His mind was so overloaded with thoughts, it felt like he'd never sleep again.

Kitty was in the center seat on the left side, While Jadia and Sabriya were both in the right seat, gazing out the window at their first real look of America. Although it was nighttime and they couldn't see much, they could still make out forms and dark shadows of Southern California. The San Bernardino Valley had been what caught the most attention. She talked with them and pointed out what was what, because they were seeing a lot of things they had never seen before. When they left the valley and drove into the mountains, the girls noted they looked much pointier and taller than the mountains they'd seen from the distance in Iraq.

When they finally arrived at the gate for the Air Force Base, Nora drove in first. When they got to the front gate, Robert rolled down his window to speak to the guard. He was nervous as he spoke because if word got out that they were headed to Iraq and the word fell into the wrong hands, it could prove to be fatal for Justin. He'd used his connections in Washington as best he could, making sure that this trip was to remain in complete secrecy until they found Justin. Robert had letters of approval of the trip right from the offices of the Department of Defense at the Pentagon, along with nine passports for all of the Walkers, plus two visas for Jadia and Sabriya.

Once the guard had approved their entry and directed them to the fourth hanger on the right side of the base, Nora drove off for the hanger, Sarah following closely behind. As Nora was driving, she still pondered over the fact that two twelve-year-old girls came half-way across the world to help a family they barely knew save a soldier one of them had met only once. "Those girls both deserve medals if you ask me." Nora said suddenly. "It was a very brave thing for them to do.

"Mom, they are a bit young to be considered Military heroes, don't you think?" Kevin said softly.

"Their age shouldn't matter." Scotty added with a yawn. "They risked their lives to do this."

"I've already found them a reward." Robert said.

"What?" Nora, Kevin, and Scotty said almost simultaneously. Robert took off his reading glasses and put them in the pocket of his leather coat.

"I spoke with one of the higher ranked officials with the Department of Defense and they said there was a possibility that they both could be granted asylum in the United States."

"Asylum?" Kevin asked, puzzled. "As in the looney bin?"

"No, it means they could stay in the United States." Robert answered. "In the eyes of the US Military, they are aiding a soldier, therefore they are aiding the country. Because they are both orphans, the choice to come back here would be up to them because they are old enough to make reasonable decisions."

"I've heard of that." Nora said. "After the Vietnam War, a lot of refugees were allowed into the United States like that."

"Correct." Robert said. "Here, this is the one." He said again, pointing to a large white building. Nora pulled off to the side of the building and parked, Sarah swinging her van in alongside her.

"However, the department is still discussing so we'd best not get their hopes up." Robert whispered to those who had listened to him as the groups piled out of the vehicles. The hanger door was already open when they got there. A small white truck began pulling out what looked like a miniature DC-10.

Robert stepped aside to speak with the marshal who handed him the papers mapping their way to Iraq. They would be given two escorts because they would be entering a designated "War Zone." That very word sent chills up and down Nora's spine. Within a few moments everybody gathered all their things together and began piling into the plane. Robert was the first to ascent the staircase which folded out from the back of the cabin door. Kitty followed with Jadia and Sabriya in tow. Julia followed, then Tommy, Kevin, and Scotty. Rebecca needed a hand getting up the stairs, having not been able to wake up fast enough, and Nora and Sarah were the last to board. They both held their breath as the door was closed and sealed behind them. Despite the situation, Kitty was a bit excited to have them aboard one of their planes. It had been Robert's first campaign plane, and she had noticed how they painted over his name on Both sides of the plane to disguise them. There was suddenly a slight jolt as the plane was towed to the runway. This was it.

The runway ran diagonally across one half of the base, point out towards the southwest. Robert quickly flipped thorough the folder he'd been handed. They were headed for Kabil Air Base in northern Iraq, near Mosul. Once there, they were on their own. The military was normally against such an operation taking place, but considering that a soldier's life may depend on it, the Department of Defense agents aware of the mission were to keep it disclosed from all other staff as well as not be involved in the operation unless requested by them to do otherwise. Three majors of the US Army stationed in Iraq were informed of the situation, also in complete secrecy, and were ordered to remain on stand-by regarding the operation.

"Okay, I need everybody to find a seat and buckle up." Robert announced. "Kitty, we are up in the cockpit."

"What?" Kitty asked, startled. "Why me?"

"Because it takes two people to man the controls." He said, cracking a smile. "Don't worry, it's easy."

Kitty rolled her eyes and followed him into the cockpit. He took a seat on the left side, buckling up and putting his headset on. Kitty looked on as the runway suddenly came into view in the form of two lines of yellow and red lights. Kitty quickly took off her jacket and took a seat, buckling her seat belt and taking a minute to figure out how to put the headset on.

"_AIR ONE, READY FOR TAKE OFF." _A voice blared loudly into Kitty's ears, causing her to rip them from her head. Robert tried to hold in a laugh as she turned down the volume. "Roger." He responded. He pulled two shifts and pressed a small red button on the control board. Kitty jumped slightly in her seat as the engines started up, causing the plane to begin vibrating. She looked Robert, whom simultaneously looked at her. Neither of them knew what would happen to them thirteen time zones to the east. She extended her hand out and he took it in his, embracing each other for a few moments. In the cabin, Nora took deep breaths and took Sarah's hand in one hand, Rebecca's in the other. Julia rested her head on Tommy's shoulder, and he kissed the top of her head gently.

"Are you alright?" Scotty asked Kevin, both of them looking at each other.

"Not sure." He responded, drumming his fingers nervously. "Are you?"

"I'm the same as you."

"Do not let your fear restrain you." A girl's voice said from in front of him. He looked up to see Jadia sitting across from him, Sabriya beside her. "My Grandmother used to tell me that fear is like darkness and light." Everybody in the cabin turned to her to listen. Robert and Kitty heard it as well through the intercom which connected to the headsets.

"When fear is seen as darkness, it stops you from doing what you were destined to do." Jadia continued. "When it is used as light in life, it strengthens you. It reminds you of the reason that you must complete the tasks you face."

Everybody knew she was right. Justin had used the light side of fear to his advantage far more than his fair share of times, now it was their turn.

Robert took a deep breath and slowly pulled back on the controls. The plane slowly began moving down the runway. Slowly, it picked up speed. Kitty's heart began to race as she saw the lights of the base flash by her. Rebecca closed here yes and began to pray for them, and for Justin. As they approached the end of the runway, Robert took a deep breath and pulled back on the controls. In a graceful rise, the plane lifted from the ground and rose into the sky. At about 1,000 feet, Robert turned the plane to the left, towards the southeast. One by one, he heard over his headsets the voices of his two escorts, which could be spotted in the darkness by their lights. As soon as they were on their right course, Robert continued the ascent to 10,000 feet. Within eleven hours they would be a world away from home, and a world closer to Justin.

To Be Continued…..


	11. A Brother's Pride

Chapter 11 – A Brother's Pride

Rabu Al Wasli was a proud man, and like many Sunni men of Iraq, he took his honor very seriously. He and his two brothers had been raised by their father to risk everything for the honor, and it would serve them well. For a while it did, for many generations the family was well known and respected throughout the Region. They had since been reduced to bandits of the desert – Nomads. Of his father's three sons, he was now the only one left. His youngest brother, Rashid had been killed in sniper fire near Baghdad two years earlier, and seven months following that Faram was killed by the American Soldier they now had in their possession. In his company were mostly Sunni militants who were outcasts in their own land.

As he pondered this plan in his mind of how this calling of fate would be managed, he meditated in his tent, listening to the soft breezes of the desert. It reminded him of his brothers. When they were children they used to play in the sand. It was a bitter sweet reminder, but he still remembered it. He felt he would bring justice to his brother's memory once the soldier responsible for his death faced his own judgment. Once that was over, it would finally put him at peace. Earlier he remembered having an argument with one of his followers.

"_You are not responsible for the actions of other people, only for your own."_

This man had made him angry. Who was he to tell him how to reclaim his fallen brother's honor. Because of his comment, that man now lie dead in the desert. Within six short days, the American called Walker would be with him.

He had learned a lot of information about Justin Walker. He learned that like him, Justin also had two brothers, as well as two sisters and his mother. The men who had taken him from America told him of another person who was apparently close to him. A young girl, perhaps 21 or 22 years in age. He assumed it was his love. This was a thought that gained him more piece of mind. Faram had never been allowed to find his love because of what Justin Walker had done. In return, Justin would now see the same fate as his brother had; death before love. Rabu glared out the crack between the two drapes of his tent and looked upon the stone hut where Walker had been imprisoned for the past eight days. He'd done this before with others who had dishonored his family, but this one was different. Walker had no fear over his own life, just over the lives of those he loved. One view Rabu had in justifying the practice was that usually when the person responsible for the dishonoring was put into the amount of pain Justin Walker was now in, they would beg for death to end the pain. The Sunni militants justified the killing as mercy. This soldier, however, did not beg for mercy. He did not beg for anything. It made Rabu's followers all uneasy about the task they were faced with. Rabu himself didn't care. His only concern was the honor he wanted back, nothing less, and nothing more.

The hours aboard McAllister's seemed to be endless. The Walkers had small conversations with one another, but they were still struggling with accepting the idea of what they were about to do. Tommy had spent three hours staring out the window down at the Atlantic Ocean. He kept checking his watch every few moments, but since they were jumping through so many time zones, he'd lost track of what the hour was. He finally stood up shakily, his legs stiff and numb from sitting for such a long time. Julia was asleep, something he was thankful for. He slowly walked over to the cabinet against the front wall of the cabin, where Kevin was fixing some drinks for himself and Scotty.

"How could you be drinking at a time like this?" He asked his younger brother.

"It's Ginger Ale, Sherlock." Kevin answered, showing Tommy the empty cans. "_Flat _Ginger Ale."

"Oh, bummer." Tommy sighed, thinking about how he could really use some scotch right about that moment. Kevin looked back at his brother's pale face and could tell something was amiss.

"I just don't understand why he didn't tell us." Kevin said softly as Tommy reached past him for a can of the ginger ale from inside the small refrigerator in the wall cabinet. "He's never had problems asking for help in the past."

"True." Tommy responded. "I've been thinking about that too." Justin had gotten himself into trouble with a number of things. He'd been using drugs on and off since 10th Grade and struggled with alcohol. Joining the military helped straighten him out in some ways, but it also made some of the problems even worse. Tommy thought of the first time he'd seen a positive change in Justin. After he came back from Afghanistan, his using habits had changed. He wasn't getting high to rid himself of the pain and displeasures of everyday life like he had before. Now he was using it to numb the pain of seeing people getting killed in a horrible war, a war they would now be facing for themselves.

"It's my fault." Kevin looked at him, startled at the comment he'd just heard.

"What are you talking about?" Kevin barely finished speaking when he remembered the night Sarah and Joe had brought Paige to the hospital, when they found out she had diabetes. When Justin showed up with the pale face and the red eyes, he remembered everything Tommy had said to him, word for word.

"That night at the hospital." Kevin said, waiting for Tommy's response.

"Yeah." Tommy answered.

"Didn't you guys fix it up?" Kevin asked. "You've been better with him since then."

"Something was still wrong."

"It wasn't your fault, Tommy." A woman's voice said from behind him. It was Rebecca standing behind him, her arms crossed gently.

"How do you know?" Tommy asked.

"I didn't notice it at first," Rebecca began. "But it looks like he's trying to solve his own problems for a change."

Both Walker brothers looked at her in confusion.

"Tell me something." Rebecca said. "Has there ever been a time where he's conquered an obstacle on his own?"

Kevin took a moment to think, but then it hit him. Whenever he had a problem, they all jumped in to help him out. But one thing that they hadn't noticed was that he'd hardly ever asked for the help. Tommy had speculated for a long time that there was something keeping him from learning how to manage things on his own. He'd always thought it had been his overprotective mother and siblings, but now he was seeing more of the picture. Justin had never had the chance to tackle the big problems in life on his own, and it seemed like he'd already known that before they figured it out. They were in the right for being there for him, but now they saw that maybe they had been overstepping a bit in the past.

"She's right." Sarah said from her seat. Tommy and Kevin looked to see her staring at them. He knows how, but we've just never let him.

"Okay, that may be true," Tommy commented. "But putting himself in danger like this is a bit extreme, you have to admit."

Sarah agreed with that. She knew Justin was very strong willed, but she also knew he had the tendency to be very hard headed, just like their father had been. "It's nobody's fault." Sarah said. "Not his, nor any of ours."

"She's right." Nora said, setting her book down on her lap. "But that doesn't matter right now. What matters right now is finding him because now he really does need our help."

Rebecca nodded, lowering her head as she sat back into her seat. She'd been pondering over this idea in her days on why Justin hadn't told her about this, or why he'd lied to her when he said everything was alright. Her best conclusion was a painful realization for her. She knew he had problems with seeing other people in pain. She thought back to when her mom told her how he'd had a drug overdose the following year. It wasn't his own pain that drove him to drugs, she thought. It was seeing people he loved and cared about in pain. He was trying to protect her all along, spare her that pain. It was one of the things she loved about him the most, his big heart. At the same time, the thing she loved about him the most also scared her to the point of madness. That big heart of his was about to get him killed.

To Be Continued….


	12. Flashback

Chapter 12 – Flashback

Kitty looked down at the landscape beneath her. The desert seemed to glow from the sand in the sunlight. She'd finally slept in her seat for a few hours, and once she'd woken up they were just approaching the border between Syria and Iraq. They were that much closer to Justin.

"Mr. McAllister?" A girl's voice said from behind her.

"Yes?" Robert asked, looking back towards the cabin door. It was Jadia, and she had in her hands a folded up map.

"I wanted to show you the map of where he is."

Robert and Kitty both glanced at each other, than he motioned yes, for her to show them. She quickly unfolded the map and held it up for him to see, making sure not to distract him off the plane's course.

"About four miles north of our village, there is an old pump house made of stone where there had once been another village. Many of the buildings around it have been destroyed in sand storms. That is where he is." Jadia said, pointing to a red "X" marked on the map. Robert remembered seeing something in the video of Justin he'd been sent. There were two large pipes in the center of the room sticking out of the ground. Kitty looked aside her chair, next to where Jadia was sitting and saw Robert's laptop folded up and leaning against the seat. Without hesitation, she opened it up and started it up. She wanted to see if it was up and that he was still there. As soon as it opened up. Robert heard the noise of his computer starting, and looked at his wife nervously as she clicked on the Icon reading "Justin". As soon as it opened, she gasped. Jadia looked at the screen and her eyes widened in terror as they processed in their minds what they were seeing. It was Justin, and two other men. They were each dressed in these heavy clothes that looked like robes, and each of them had these long black cords in their hands and they were beating him with them. She quickly looked up at the corner of the screen and saw that it was recording, so what they were seeing was happening right at that moment. She looked again at the bar at the bottom of the screen and saw that it had been recording for the past day and a half. Before that they had been recording in 18 hour sections. Jadia saw what time the video before the last one started, only thirteen minutes after they had left. She remembered back to that night, how she and Sabriya had run from there as fast as they could, trying to get to the main road to catch a bus. They'd watched behind them as the wind blew away their footprints. They had just escaped in time to avoid being stuck out in a sandstorm.

Kitty closed the laptop firmly, resisting the urge to chuck it out the window after what she'd seen. Tommy wasn't the only one who'd blamed themselves for what was happening to Justin. Ever since that night, when she'd gotten the call from Rebecca, she knew it was her fault. She just realized then that she had never told her husband that she was there.

"Robert." She stated. He turned to her.

"Do you remember when I told you how I used to live in New York?"

"Yes."

"I saw it." Kitty said, choking over her own words. "I was there when it happened, I was downtown, just six blocks away."

"From what?" He asked. She looked at him for a moment, then he realized with a ghastly look on his face what she meant.

"Oh God." He gasped silently.

"I saw both of the planes, the smoke, the jumpers, the collapsing of the towers, everything." She said. She had flashes in her mind of New York being swallowed up by the cloud of debris that erupted from where the World Trade Center. The crying and screaming, anger and hatred, everything. She thought back to when she had come home from New York after a few days. She remembered talking to Justin, crying into his shoulder, him wrapping his arms around her, holding her. Trying to protect her.

"That's what pushed him to enlist, wasn't it?" Robert asked softly and firmly. Kitty nodded.

"I remember that." Jadia said from her seat on the floor between the two seats. Robert put his focus back on the controls. It had been a few years since he'd flown a plane himself, but it had all come back to him like riding a bicycle. Kitty listened to Jadia closer.

"I saw it on TV, and it said so many people had died." She said, ringing her hands gently. "A lot of people in Iraq were cheering and shouting." Kitty felt her body tense up with anger at that statement. "At the same time, a lot of people were sad and crying. A lot of the kids in my class at my school cried. My grandmother wept uncontrollably for days. Women tore at their clothing and sobbed loudly, and men were praying every day. In our village, almost every window of every house had a candle lit in vigil." Kitty's body relaxed after Jadia had finished. Jadia had noticed the tension in a better way than Kitty imagined a twelve-year-old ever could. "Iraq has a beauty to it that makes the desert look like the Garden of Eden." Jadia said poetically. "The evils in the land outnumber them, and that's why few people notice them anymore."

There was silence in the Cockpit for a few moments until a voice came onto the radio.

"_Flight ID 6372, you are approaching the landing strip at Mosul, you have clearance to land." _An American Voice called over the Radio.

"Jadia, you'd better get back to your seat, and you and Sabriya remember to buckle up." Kitty told the girl in a nice voice, trying to lift her spirit.

"I'm sorry, Kitty." Jadia apologized. "I didn't mean to make you upset."

"Oh, you didn't. Don't worry." She said, smiling at the face Jadia gave back. That look of relief. At that moment she had the first pleasant though she'd had in days. She hoped that when Trish gave birth to their baby, that it was a girl. In the cockpit view, the city of Mosul seemed to grow out of the desert, a colorful array of buildings in every shape and size. She felt her throat tighten as they came lower and lower to the ground, in one of the most dangerous places in the world. She was nervous, but she wasn't scared.

"_Justin, Now it's my turn."_

To Be Continued…..


	13. In the Face of Danger

Chapter 13 – In the face of Danger

One by one, the Walkers stepped off the plane, which several Arabs in uniforms rushed to get into a hanger before an operative saw it. What this family was doing had to be taken very seriously and done in complete secret, something Robert had explained over the phone to the general of the base. They walked in a line across the Tarmac to the base headquarters. Rebecca looked around at the city and felt really distanced from her surroundings. The air felt warmer and dryer, like the Santa Anna winds had been blown into Los Angeles and the hot air dumped on the city. It smelled different as well. She couldn't describe it to herself fully, but the one scent she could recognize was gasoline. At first she just assumed it was from the planes, but she smelled it in the breeze as well. It was everywhere. She quickly regained the grip on her bag and followed the rest of the Walkers into the main headquarters. Robert walked at the front of the line, Kitty and Jadia close behind. As soon as they walked in the front door, they were met by a man in a green General's uniform.

"Senator McAllister," He began, holding out his hand. "General Martin Andrews."

"Pleasure to meet you sir." Robert responded, returning the handshake. Andrews looked down to Robert's sides and saw the two Iraqi girls standing next to him. "Are these the girls?"

"Yes, they are." Kitty responded. Andrews held out his hand to shake hers.

"This is my wife, Kitty." Robert said, glancing back at his wife. "Justin's older sister."

"I'm very sorry about these circumstances, Mrs. McAllister. Kitty nodded silently as Robert continued to Introduce the rest of the Walkers.

"This is Justin's mother, Nora Walker." Robert said, motioning to Nora, who was quickly brushing the tangles out of her hair and extending her hand.

"It's a pleasure, and you have my condolences, Mrs. Walker."

"_Ms_. Walker," Nora corrected. "and you can call me Nora."

"Alright then." Andrews responded. Robert turned down the line with the introductions. "This is Sarah Walker, Justin's eldest sister." He said, going next to Sarah. Sarah said nothing as she shook the general's hand, she just cracked a smile. Under normal circumstances she would have been offended by the "eldest" phrase Robert had used, but right now she didn't care.

"Next, this is Tommy Walker and his wife Julia." Robert said, motioning to Tommy and Julia as the General shook their hands. Tommy crossed his arms impatiently and his breathing got heavier. Julia rested her hand on his shoulder, looking at him right in the eyes. "You're not going to help anything losing your cool here." Julia whispered nervously. "Save it for later."

"This is Kevin Walker and his partner Scotty Wandell." Robert said as the general continued down the line and shook Kevin's hand, and then Scotty's.

"And last but not least, this is Rebecca Harper." Robert said to the general. "Justin's girlfriend."

The General raised his eyebrows at the sight of Rebecca. "What you are doing is very commendable, Miss Harper." He commented.

"Thank you." Rebecca said, shaking his hand. "All I want to do is find him."

"About that." The General began. "I've been informed of the Situation and I must inform you that the military group responsible for this is one with a history of extremely violent actions."

"We are aware of that." Robert said. "We're well aware of the dangers." The general looked from Robert to each and every one of the Walkers. He could tell when people were nervous or scared by the looks on their faces, and not one of them had that look upon their faces.

"Alright then." The general sighed. "We'll offer our assistance whenever we can. We have a vehicle with a driver ready to transport you to the village."

Robert nodded. "Is there a place where we could prepare?"

"Of course." He said, leading them down a narrow corridor to two rooms at the end. There was one for men and one for women, and they were both marked "Field Prep".

"Everything you will need is in there. Armor, clothing, gear, and…" He hesitated before mentioning ammunition.

"I understand." Kitty said, stepping out in front of Robert. "But we've brought our own artillery."

Just at that moment, three guards came from outside carrying six large black gun-shaped cases and two square metal trunks. The General looked at the cases as they were brought into the prep rooms, and looked back at the family. Nora stepped forward to speak with the general.

"My late husband, Private William Walker," Nora said with slight pride. "Had a colorful military career and passed much of his knowledge onto his family."

"Oh."

"So, General Andrews." Nora said, stepping past him and pushing the women's room door open. "We'll take it from here."

Nora stormed past him politely and the door closed behind her. The Walkers paused for a moment, and then the door swung open.

"MOVE IT, LADIES!" Nora barked. Sarah and Kitty smiled humorously and picked up their bags, eagerly walking through the door. Jadia and Sabriya followed them, then followed by Julia and Rebecca. The door closed behind them, leaving the men in the hallway.

"Yeah, what she said." Robert said, cracking a smile as he went into the men's room followed by Tommy, Kevin, and Scotty.

* * *

"Woah, wait a minute." Rebecca said startled as she saw Kitty and Sarah open two of the gun cases and pull out two large rifles. "We're taking on Iraqi militants with hunting rifles?" Sarah and Kitty both scoffed at that comment.

"Hey, I can shoot the bark off of an Elm tree from a mile away." Kitty said, holding her gun in her hands. Sarah picked up her shotgun and admired the wood body. Both of them were long and polished, her shotgun was a gift from her father, rebuilt from a gun dating back to the Civil War. Kitty's gun was very similar. Both were custom built Remington shotguns, not the cheapest guns on the planet, but worth every penny.

"Rebecca, don't worry." Kitty said, taking her shotgun in her hands and aiming it around the room. "If they worked at Gettysburg, they can work here."

They all had been given brown and tan colored clothing, a desert-friendly alternative to camouflage. Nora wore a gray vest with tan jeans. Kitty wore a tank top and shorts, both in faded brown. Julia wore a tank top covered with a light tan blouse, along with a tan skirt. Rebecca was wearing the same as kitty, only in light tan. Sarah wore a regular tan t-shirt with brown shorts. Sabriya and Jadia both wore dark tan t-shirts and faded denim shorts. All of them wore bullet proof vests underneath their clothes, but other than that not much more armor. They didn't want to stand out too much.

Rebecca looked at them nervously, especially when it seemed like it didn't bother Nora very much. She looked behind her as she buckled her bulletproof vest on and covered it with her shirt. She looked back to see Julia's expression, but saw that Julia was digging through one of the trunks that had been brought into her room. Sarah walked up behind her to grab the bullets and loading materials needed for her and Kitty's rifles, when she saw Julia pull two smaller gun cases, both of them had her maiden name inscribed on them.

"They might not be as big as yours, Sarah," Julia said with a grin as she opened one of the cases and pulled out an automatic revolver, polished with chrome finish.

"Woah." Kitty said. "I knew you were into collecting guns like Tommy was, but this one looks vintage."

"Yep." Julia responded, pulling out her other revolver. "Both of them were designed from post-1900 models, one of my mom's friends made them by hand. My parents own about two dozen of them."

"Are those the kind of guns they use in America?" Sabriya asked, looking at all the guns.

"Yes, sweetheart." Nora said. "Our family has been collecting many types of old guns for many years."

"I understand." Jadia said. "We've seen boys younger than us practicing with a lot of different guns out in the desert."

The five American women looked at the two girls with slight shock. The thought of children fighting in the wars had come into their minds, but it didn't fully sink in until Jadia had made that statement.

"My brother was only eight when he died." Sabriya said softly. "He and many other boys tried to run off the Sunnis with the men in our village, many years ago. My uncle died that day, too."

"As well as my grandmother." Jadia said, reaching into her pocket and pulling out a crumpled up picture of her when she was younger, standing and smiling with an older woman. "I was at school, and the house was set on fire. Nobody could have saved her." Nora walked over and stood between the two girls, not even thinking to ask this question before. "Do either of you have any family left?"

"We have distant relatives in Syria." Jadia said softly. "Sabriya has a great Aunt and Uncle in Damascus and my mother's cousin lives in the countryside near the city."

"Nobody else?" Nora asked softly.

Both girls shook their heads. "All dead." Sabriya said.

"That is why we were so determined to help Justin." Jadia said, her eyes filling with tears as she continued to speak. As she listened, Rebecca gained a clearer and stronger understanding of Justin's reasons for enlisting in the military. "He tried to stop the fighting as much he could. He saved me, and he very well may have saved somebody else that day. He and those other men fought for us as if we were their own people."

"You're right, Jadia." Nora said, putting her arm around the crying girl's shoulder. "Justin is a very brave person, all those men and women are."

Sabriya smiled as she reflected on a positive memory about her parents. "I remember what my mother and father used to say." She said as the women focused on her. "Bravery is essential to achieving happiness, because it enables us to live without the restraint of fear."

The women each nodded, some of them tearing up.

"Let's do this with that bravery." Kitty said. "For Justin." She put her hand in the center of the circle.

"Yeah." Rebecca said, putting her hand in. Sarah and Julia followed with their hands, and last but not least, Nora rested her hands on top of the stack, which was then topped with Jadia and Sabriya's hands. "For Justin." They all said simultaneously before withdrawing their hands and continuing to prepare for the fight of their lives.

* * *

In the other room, the four guys were hastily gathering themselves. The four of them were also dressed in tan and brown colors. Robert had on Brown jeans with a black sleeveless shirt, Tommy had on tan jeans with a t shirt, covered with a darker colored collared shirt with short sleeves. Scotty dressed in shorts and a sleeveless T-shirt, with a bandanna tied around his head covering his hair. Kevin was wearing shorts and a collared shirt covered with a vest, all in faded light brown. Scotty helped Kevin tie a brown cloth over his head as they both kept looking down at the shotgun case on the bench nearby.

"Are you nervous?" Scotty asked.

"Actually, not really." Kevin answered. "Now I'm going to get to see what Justin has seen."

"Yeah, we all will." Tommy added as he checked out his shotgun. He and Kevin both had vintage Remington shotguns their father had given the five of them one Christmas. These weren't like their other hunting rifles, these ones were used for defense. At home, Tommy kept his in the closet behind his old football trophies, out of Elizabeth's reach and Kevin kept his in the umbrella stand all the years he'd lived in his apartment. Robert mentioned how Kitty kept hers mounted on the wall, while Sarah locked hers away in her house. Right from the start, they all noticed Robert's gun case was a bit bigger. They were all surprised when he pulled out a Gauge shotgun. He hadn't used it in years and luckily was able to track down a store of the proper ammunition for it on the base before they'd arrived.

"Kitty was shocked to hear that I even still had it."

"I'll bet." Tommy said with a smirk as he tried to hold in a laugh.

"Wait, is that what that noise was that I'd heard earlier from her?" Kevin asked. "I thought you'd just hit a bug or something."

"Nope." Robert answered, checking out the same gun he'd used in the Gulf War. "It took me years to track it down after my service ended." Tommy stood up and walked over next to Robert to get a better look at the gun. It looked like it'd been through some rough use, but other than that it was still in pretty good condition. Robert gently set it down back in the case and closed the lid. He had a tight feeling in his stomach that made him uneasy. Justin hadn't handled remembering what he'd seen over here very well, which told them it was going to be bad, without a doubt. As soon as he shook it off, he picked up four metal flasks one of the guards had given him and turned to his brothers in law.

"We should make a toast."

"What?" Tommy asked. "Is this really the right time."

"I think it is." He answered. "It might be our last chance, for both him and us."

* * *

Justin's breath labored as he heard the door lock clicking. He prepared himself for the worst as he heard it open up and the footsteps of three men walk into the room. Two of them stood behind him, and the other one, turning out to be Rabu, kneeled down aside him. He was laying on his side and could look right into Rabu's face.

"Tell me something, dear friend." Rabu began, holding out a white piece of paper. "What do you see?"

Justin looked on as Rabu turned the piece of paper over. As soon as he saw it, Justin's heart stopped. His eyes widened and he almost choked over his own breath. In the photo, which had been enhanced, two girls were walking along the tarmac of an Airport which looked like it was either in Baghdad or Mosul. Not only did the girls look familiar, but the nine people with them looked _very very _familiar. He held in another breath when he heard two guns lock behind him.

"Are we done here?" One of the men behind him asked.

"Not quite." Rabu said. "This might actually work to our advantage." He glared down at Justin. Justin looked up at him, his throat tensing and two drops of sweat rolled down his already sweat drenched skin, stinging his eyes and the open sores on his face.

"Nothing suits an honor killing better than an audience."

To Be Continued…..


	14. A Different World

Chapter 14 – A Different World

Within a short 38 minutes after their arrival at the base at Mosul, the Walkers were shown outside to the street, where a minibus was waiting. The military had their motor pool stocked up with civilian vehicles for undercover operations, such as this one. The few military operatives who knew about this knew that it was going to be tricky keeping this undercover, considering one of them was a US Senator and another was an active political speaker and a writer. The driver was dressed in traditional civilian clothes, as were two additional "passengers" who were actually members of the US army; one weapons expert and another communications operator. As they boarded the bus, the driver looked over the map Jadia had drawn over where the camp was. Before they left, the women were given shawls in different to cover their hair with, in order to blend in with the crowd on the way there.

"This is just fantastic." Kitty said as she took her seat. "My brother could be on his deathbed, I'm in one of the most dangerous regions on earth, and I have to take on a bunch of militants looking like a nun."

"Kitty, be respectful!" Nora snapped, glancing around behind her, looking to see if anybody was listening.

"Kitty, that's not funny." Rebecca said sternly, itching her head through the shawl.

"Alright, alright." Kitty said, trying to calm them down. "I'm just nervous."

"We're all nervous, Kitty." Robert said, putting his arm around her. She sighed miserably as she rested her head on his shoulder. Sarah and Rebecca sat next to each other across the aisle, Rebecca gripping Sarah's hand. Julia was saying prayers for everybody in her head silently while Tommy was leaning forward, resting his head on the back of the seat in front of him and his hands were grasped together in his lap. He wasn't too much of a religious person, but now he was praying. As the engine started up and the bus door slid closed, they began the six hour drive to a village in the desert. Scotty stared out the window, looking at the faces that went by. At one corner just outside of Mosul, he saw a little girl walking along the road with her mother. The girl waved hello, Scotty just smiling back at her. He wasn't sure if he could wave or not. This trip was different than it had been on the plane, now they were looking at Iraq up close and personal. They saw many temples and large buildings with ornate stone carvings and tiles of so many different colors laid out to form shapes, symbols, or even pictures. After Mosul disappeared behind them and they drove into the countryside, they saw landscapes they didn't think they'd see in the Middle East. Although it was mostly rocky and sandy desert, there were still trees growing in a few places. After about 90 minutes, it was almost 2 o'clock in the afternoon, Baghdad time. When he opened his laptop again to check on Justin's time frame, it hadn't changed from when they had left Pasadena. They were now down to 5 days, 9 hours, and 53 minutes. Justin looked unconscious, and his condition had worsened. His white collared shirt was gone and replaced with an old, ragged white shirt, which had a large red stain on the chest, near Justin's collarbone. Something else that Robert saw now was that he was bandaged up in that area. It looked like his entire left shoulder was encased in bandages. He closed his laptop quickly before anyone else got a chance to look at it. He joined the others in watching Iraq pass them by.

The hours passed as they drove over roads, both paved and gravel, moving past Baghdad and southwest towards Jadia and Sabriya's village. In many areas the landscape was rugged and hilly with large rocky foothills and jagged cliffs of red rock rising from the sand. Sand dunes blown by the desert winds stood tall above the roads as well as had been blown flat, exposing views of the desert that went on for miles. To Nora, it seemed like she was on another planet. She'd kept her maternal instincts relatively under control for the past few days, but inside she was going crazy. One moment her heart was pounding like it would blow out of her chest and fly out the window, and then the next her head was pounding with a splitting headache. No matter how much it had hurt, she kept her eyes on the desert. _"He's out there, he's out there."_ She heard her own voice whisper in her head.

"We're there." The driver whispered as he came to a stop near a cluster of buildings. The Walkers all got a glimpse of the village where this mess had all started. Small brick buildings painted white were clustered together, divided half-way by the main road they were on. Some of the buildings looked old, and others looked fairly new. Near the front of the village side they were facing were three burned out houses, now reduced to rubble, chipped masses of bricks and splintered wood was all that remained of what had once been somebody's home. The driver paused with the family to look at the village for a moment, he pushed the rag tied around his head up a bit to wipe his forehead with his hand, the rag already being drenched with sweat. The heat had intensified over the past hour, and was well over 100 degrees by that point. The driver took a deep breath and looked at Jadia's map, turning to the north just before the village. He looked and noticed a gravel road turning to the Northeast.

"Is this it?" He asked.

"Yes." Jadia answered. The driver revved up the engine of the bus and took a left turn off of the main road and onto a gravel path that went up into the rocky hills north of the village, into the desert. Two miles up the road, Jadia suddenly squealed "STOP!"

The tires of the bus skidded in the gravel and came to a stop behind a large boulder, blocking the bus from view from the north. A small amount of dust was kicked into the air, making the driver nervous. Everybody watched as the cloud of dust was quickly swallowed up by a gust of wind and vanished into thin air. "Okay, here we go." Robert said as he immediately rose from his seat and clambered down the stairs just second after the driver opened it. He gently ran along the side of the bus, Tommy and Kitty in tow. They opened up the storage compartment on the backside of the bus and pulled out the cases with the guns. The weapons expert, who had introduced himself as Erik, began to help them suit up. Robert had gotten a Hollister with a leather box for the bullets, which he hung from the side of his belt. Kevin filled the pockets of his vest with rounds and shot, while Tommy had a Hollister pouch attached to his own belt, like Robert did. Both Kitty and Sarah had a leather Hollister as well for bullets and shot, as did Julia. Just before Robert slammed the door for the compartment shut, Rebecca stopped him and crawled into the compartment.

"Rebecca?"

"What is she doing?"

"Hey, Rebecca!"

"What, are you hiding in there or something?" Voices called from behind her. She simply rolled her eyes as she pulled out a large black plastic case. As she dragged it out, it landed on the ground with a thud. The others watched around her as she opened to reveal something that made her eyes glisten with joy. The contents of the box revealed a large Compound Bow with a Quiver filled with arrows.

"So, what do you guys think?" She asked. "It's a new model and considering the urgency of this situation, the base let me borrow it."

Everybody glanced back at Erik. "Yes, we lent it to her." Everybody turned back to her as she hung the Quiver over her shoulder and picked up the bow.

"I took archery lessons for 7 years." Rebecca said. "My mom would do anything to keep me occupied while she worked."

Sarah rolled her eyes at that comment, but Rebecca didn't care. They all looked on as Jadia stood in front of the group, Sabriya alongside her.

"The abandoned village is nestled in the sand dunes." Jadia said, pointing to the north. "It's not that far away."

Jadia and Sabriya turned and began walking along the trail through the rocks and the sand, off towards the north.

"If you need backup, radio for me." Bryan, the communications operator told the others, handing Robert a radio. He hesitated in taking it.

"That might not be too good of an Idea." Robert said. "They might have radios that could track the frequencies."

Bryan nodded. He hadn't thought of that. He then snapped his fingers and pulled out a signal flare gun.

"Fire one shot and we'll drive in to help." Bryan said, handing Robert the gun. "Fire two and I'll call for backup."

"Much better." Robert said as he took a deep breath and began following the girls. Kitty followed him into the desert, followed by Nora, then Rebecca, then Tommy, then Julia, then Scotty, and last but not least Kevin. Once they got a ways in and began do descend down a hill, Kevin looked back and waved at the three military men in the bus one last time before he disappeared from their view.

To Be Continued…..


	15. The Tables have Turned

Chapter 15 – The Tables have Turned

The sun was still high in the sky as the Walkers, led by the two girls who had navigated the winding trail through the sand dunes and rocky bluffs by nothing but the light from the moon. The two miles seemed more like twenty miles as they climbed to the tops of sand dunes that seemed to bend to the touch of their feet, sending waves of soft, hot sand rolling down the side of the dune and collecting in piles at the bottom. When they came to two large bluffs enclosed between two tall sand dunes. Together, they seemed to create a large wall, as if it was part of a fortress. In between the two bluffs was a narrow gorge about five or six feet wide. Jadia and Sabriya started to make their way through it, but everybody else stopped behind Robert, who looked up at the cliff faces.

"Wait, Girls!" He hissed loudly, catching their attention. "Get against the sides." The girls got along the left edge of the gorge and the group slowly began to file through. Kitty and Nora kept close behind Robert, Kitty having her gun ready and watching the lines where the edges of the cliff were silhouetted against the sky. They looked in fear of snipers.

Rebecca held her bow in tension, her breath labored. Behind her, Tommy had his eyes on the sky, one hand behind him grasping Julia's hand. Scotty and Kevin kept looking behind them, as they weren't in the best place to be surprised. As soon as they got out into the open, Robert and Tommy both took their guns in their hands and searched around. They both walked ahead of the group, Jadia and Sabriya between them, the others following. Once they got into a clearing, they saw it.

"There it is." Jadia whispered, pointing to a small cluster of wood buildings on top of a rocky hill. Robert looked around and took a mental overview of the village. He could see four buildings still standing, plus a large stone structure behind them. That was where Justin had to be.

"Okay, we're going in." Robert whispered. "Tommy, you and Kevin come with me, the rest of you cover us."

"It's going to be okay." Tommy whispered to Julia while Kevin gave Scotty a quick hug. Nora pulled the girls back and they all moved up a hill facing the village from another side, to get a better view. As they moved closer to the buildings, Kitty watched as her husband and brothers crept slowly along the rocky path up to the first building. Once the women had reached the top of the hill, Kitty, Sarah, and Julia all had their arms ready and focused on the first building. Rebecca watched on as well, grabbing an arrow and loading it into her bow, crouching low to the ground while she watched.

Robert and Tommy reached the first building, hearing voices in Arabic language from deeper inside the hideout. As Kevin reached the wall and pressed flat against it, the three men peered around the corners. Kevin looked around one corner, and when he looked back at Tommy and Robert, his eyes quickly fixed on the dark figure standing on the roof above them.

"LOOK OUT!" Kevin said as in one swift movement, he fired one bullet at the man, sending him flying from the roof and landing in front of them, dead. Suddenly, several men rose from the roofs of three of the buildings, and at that moment Kitty and Sarah began gunning them down.

"Oh God, Justin!" Rebecca shouted as she took off, Julia following behind her.

"Rebecca! Julia!" Nora cried, holding the two girls back. She watched as Rebecca quickly shot two arrows through the air, taking out two of the militants on the roof of the third building. That's when the yelling started as twenty men rushed out of the largest building, gunfire erupting between the two groups. Robert jumped out into the street and in one quick wave, took down at least half of them with his automatic. Kevin stormed down the right side of the village, coming to the first opening between the buildings and clashing with a man with a sword. The man knocked Kevin off his feet, raising his sword high in the air. Just before he lowered it, a gray arrow impaled his chest and he fell backwards over what Kevin found to be a cliff, dropping some fifty feet to the ground below. He looked back and saw Rebecca standing, bow ready.

"Thanks" He said with a sigh of relief.

"Kevin!" She barked again, looking past him at two more men rushing towards them. Kevin dove to the ground, dodging bullets and took them both out with his rifle. He quickly owed his quick reflexes to the Jazz and Tap lessons he'd taken during high school.

Tommy shot down another militant as Julia ran towards him. She looked above where he was and saw a man about to jump down onto him.

"Tommy!" She screamed as she opened fire on the man, taking him down as well as two others. After seeing Julia, Kitty rose from her firing spot behind the rock and ran towards the village. Heart racing painfully, she shot down the main road, taking out three more men. She ran between the first two buildings and came across Robert struggling with another militant on the ground. She quickly kicked the man off her husband and shot him without haste. Robert turned to her, his face scratched and bleeding on his right cheek. In his heavy breathing, he quickly looked past her and noticed a man with two swords approaching her.

"Kitty, behind you!" Robert shouted, but before she could turn around, the man was shot down from the front of the village. Tommy approached him from the other way, Julia behind him. As Kitty helped him up, they saw Kevin and Rebecca running towards them. As the six of them met at the center of the buildings, they then turned to the large stone building behind the wooden ones. The camp had gone quiet. Guns ready, they approached the pump house. When they found the door padlocked, Kitty simply lifted her rifle and shot it off with one bullet. As soon as the door was opened, She ran inside, going down a dark hallway along the side of the building.

"Justin!" She screamed as she ran down the hall, hoping he'd respond. The few seconds before she turned the corner she kept repeating in her head, _please don't be dead, please don't be dead, please don't be dead_, She found the room. She recognized it from the video, but when she looked down her heart froze.

"He's Gone!" She screamed as suddenly, from outside, they heard a loud noise, like a truck engine starting. They rushed back outside to see a large covered truck pull out from beside the pump house and stop right in front of the group. As the back of it was exposed, Robert, Kitty, Tommy, Julia, Kevin, and Rebecca all froze when twenty more men, each with a gun, had them on target. Everything fell silent. They immediately noticed a short, scrawny man with a thick beard. When he began to speak, Robert recognized his voice immediately.

So, this is the family of the brave Justin Walker." The man said, clapping twice before the sarcastic smile on his face began to fade. "I must say I didn't expect untrained civilians to do so much damage." He said, looking at all the dead bodies scattered throughout the street.

"Where is he?" Robert asked in a loud and firm voice.

"Who are you referring to?"

"My Brother." Kitty growled, glaring at the man. Rabu tapped his foot on a large wooden box, rectangular in shape.

"He's not finished with the task he needs to complete." Rabu said with a grin.

"And what task would that be?" Kevin asked with the same Walker family trademark Glare.

"Restoring the honor he took from my family." Rabu said, spitting on the crate. "Unfortunately, the way I had originally planned will never work now that you have found us." He said, leaping from the back of the truck, followed by four men.

"I do have another imposition." Rabu said. "A deal of sorts."

Robert kept his eyes firmly on Rabu, taking a deep breath before speaking. "Deal?"

"Yes." Rabu said. "I may not be as traditional as most men in my country, but I do want my honor restored, no matter what the costs." His voice grew as he talked, so loud that Sarah, Nora, and Scotty could hear from a quarter mile away.

"Because now the honor of two families is at stake, I propose a dual instead." He said, twirling his beard with one of his fingers. "Normally Justin would have to stand responsible for his actions, but because he cannot stand up at all, one of you could take his place."

There was a hush of silence amongst the Walkers for a moment, until a man's voice spoke up.

"I'll do it." Tommy said, stepping forward. "I'll take his place." Julia gasped.

"Tommy?" Julia whispered, horrified at what he'd just done. He moved his lips just slightly, motioning his hand to calm her. Julia looked at Rebecca, and now found herself faced with the same situation.

"_Please be brave, Julia." _Tommy mouthed to her. _"For her._"

Julia's face softened as she thought of Elizabeth. She took a moment, but was finally able to no her head just before two of the men each took Tommy by the arm and pushed him up into the truck.

"If he wins, they will both go free." Rabu said.

Robert swallowed before he spoke. "And if he loses?"

"Then they will both face Judgment." He snapped as he drew the back of the truck closed and it began to move. Kitty gasped and clasped her hand to her mouth. Julia let out two silent sobs and began to take off after the truck. She hadn't even made two steps before Robert grabbed her and held her back as they watched the truck go back down the road, turn right, and disappear from view. From there, they saw the village had rested on top of a cliff jutting out from the edge of a large hill. They stood there for a few moments in shock as the cloud of dust the truck kicked up slowly disappeared into the evening sky. Kitty and Robert looked back when they heard voices coming from the front of the village. She saw Nora and Sarah running towards them, Scotty still standing at the entrance to the village with Jadia and Sabriya. As Nora approached them, she knew something had gone terribly wrong. She'd expected to see Justin there, but she was now shocked to see another one of her sons was now missing.

"Where's Tommy?" She asked after pausing for a moment. Kitty felt her eyes swell up with tears as she approached her mother.

"Mom."

"Where is he?"

"Oh, God Mom." Kitty said again.

Where is he?" Nora growled in a deep voice. Sarah rushed to help Rebecca pull Julia up from the ground, but she wouldn't move. Robert came and scooped her off the ground.

"Mom-" Kitty began.

"Katherine Anne, Where is your brother?!" Nora barked.

"They took him." She said, crying. Nora suddenly turned very white.

"What?" She gasped. By now, Kitty couldn't talk anymore. She just sobbed. Kevin took her in his arms while Rebecca watched, her face was just as pale.

"Nora," Robert began to in form her. "They decided to give one of us a chance to defend the family honor in Justin's place. Tommy volunteered."

Nora didn't say anything. She just stood there for a moment, her mouth open and hanging as she suddenly fell to the ground, fainting. At that site, Scotty quickly pulled the signal flare out of his pocket. "Stand Back." He said to Jadia and Sabriya as he pulled the plastic cord off and pulled the trigger. A red ball of light shot into the sky and burst into a forked spark as the sun set over the Arabian desert. Now the lives of two Walkers were hanging in the balance.

To Be Continued…..


	16. Realization

Chapter 16 – Realization

Tommy had lost track of where he was going, or what direction he was moving in. He'd been blindfolded and his hands tied together behind his back. Every now and then he heard men whisper things in Arabic, and somebody was smoking a pipe because he could smell the smoke of raw tobacco. He was sitting on the edge of the truck and had his feet against the crate containing his brother. He was almost jolted out of his seat when the truck suddenly came to a screeching halt. He heard everybody in the truck clamber around and then felt two sets of hands grab him by the arms and pull him from the truck. He fell hard on his back, yelling out in pain for a moment before he was pulled to his feet and dragged a ways. He heard a door open so he could tell he was inside a building. He was pushed through another doorway when his blindfold was pulled off. After his vision cleared, he saw a man about six inches shorter than him pointing a gun at him square in the chest, forcing him to hold his breath. He felt behind him as another man cut off the leather cords binding his hands together and replacing them with handcuffs. He heard the clicking and tried to turn to see who was doing it, but then found that the chain was looped around the bars of what looked like a prison cell. They were in a cement block building somewhere, and the red cliff wall on one side of the room told him it was built into a cliff face. Although it was very dark, there was a fluorescent light flickering above him and he watched on as they brought in the crate. They simply flipped it open and out spilled Justin. He landed hard on his shoulder on the cement floor, grunting loudly as he turned onto his back, away from Tommy. Tommy froze in shock when he saw his brother, then turning angrily towards the two men who now locked the door to the cell and left the two of them in the silence. Once they had gone, he tried to turn his head behind him to see the cuffs, tugging at them. He looked at Justin, pausing for a moment. He heard his brother's deep and heavy breathing, telling him that his brother was in tremendous pain, laying about ten feet in front of him. He didn't know if it was instinct or anger or just plain old fear but he pressed both of his feet against the bars as hard as he could, until the chain finally snapped and he sent himself flying halfway across the room, landing just four feet from Justin. He groaned in pain for a moment after absorbing the shock with his hands and knees, and then focused on his brother. He crawled over to Justin's still figure. For a moment, he honestly thought he was dead.

"Oh God." He whispered as he looked at all his brother's injuries. The right side of his face was covered with knicks and scrapes and dried blood, a long thin gash receding from his hairline. His bad knee was bandaged with thick cloth, which was now stained red. He moved to rest his open palm on Justin's chest, to see if he could feel a heartbeat. When he did, he quickly withdrew his hand when he felt Justin had several broken ribs, and Justin's entire body flinched and he gritted his teeth, pinching his eyes closed.

"Justin?" Tommy asked, praying for a response. Justin blinked madly for a few seconds as his vision cleared, and slowly his vision cleared and he looked up to see his older brother looking down at him.

"Tommy?" He asked weakly.

"Yeah, Justin, It's me." Tommy said, his hands on Justin's shoulder. "I'm here."

"What are you doing here?"

Tommy glared at his brother. "Do I really have to answer that?"

"How did you find me?"

"Well, It looks like somebody owed you a favor." Tommy said. It didn't take Justin very long to connect the dots.

"Jadia?"

"Yep." Tommy answered. "She and her friend Sabriya came and found us."

"What?" Justin said, opening his eyes more.

"Yeah, they led us here to you."

"Wait a minute," Justin started, regaining his voice. "Define _we_."

"Me, Julia, Mom, Kitty, Robert, Kevin, Scotty, Sarah and Rebecca."

Justin stared at Tommy for a moment before slowly closing his eyes and resting his head on the floor with a soft thud.

"Justin?" Tommy asked gently, shaking Justin's shoulder gently.

"I would rather be dead right now than have all of you bear witness to it."

Tommy was aghast. "_What_?" He hissed. Justin took a minute to answer his brother's question.

"I knew this was going to happen. I caused it, it was my responsibility."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Tommy asked.

"I killed his brother, this was my burden, not yours or Mom's or Rebecca's." He said, stopping at Rebecca's name. He paused for a moment in silence.

"Where is she?" Justin asked.

"Who, Rebecca?"

"Yeah."

"They left her at the village with Mom and the others."

"Wait a minute," Justin interrupted. "How'd you get here?"

Tommy paused for a moment. He hadn't thought about how to face Justin with the fact.

"That Rabi guy proposed a duel to defend the Walker family honor." Tommy began.

"Duel, what do-" Justin began before hit him. "No."

"He asked to fight one of us, and I volunteered."

"Oh, God Dammit Tommy!" Justin snapped. "How could you do that?"

"Because I have four siblings and I'd kinda like to keep it that way."

"Tommy, it's not up to all of you to solve all my problems!"

"Is it up to me to sit back and watch you get yourself killed?" Tommy asked angrily. "When in the hell are you going to get it through your thick skull?"

"Get what?"

"Justin, do you remember when Kitty broke her ankle on the track when she joined the track team in the 11th grade? How Dad and I ran out onto the field and carried her off the track?"

Justin nodded.

"That's how families take care of each other." Tommy said. "I really thought you of all people would know that."

Justin said nothing, but kept looking on at his brother.

"When I broke my arm in football and Sarah typed up all my final papers in time for me after I wrote them, and she helped me stay out of getting kicked off the team for failing those classes, that's how we help each other out. When Joe and Sarah would be yelling and screaming at each other at night, Mom let Paige and Cooper spend the night. That's how we look out for each other. And finally, when your girlfriend saved your life by telling us you were using drugs again, that's how we take care of the people we love."

That sentence hit Justin hard, harder than anything that had hit him in the past week. It wasn't until then that he'd realized what damage he'd caused his family, and Rebecca. A single tear rolled down the side of his face, dripping onto the floor.

"I'm sorry, Tommy." Justin said softly, choking on his own words. "I'm so sorry."

"Don't apologize." Tommy said. "How we got here doesn't matter anymore. What does matter is how we're going to get out."

Justin looked at his brother, trying desperately to figure out what to do.

"I understand what you were trying to do." Tommy said. "You were trying to take care of all of us."

"Yeah, I was." Justin answered. "Everybody is always taking care of me, and I just wanted to do it for a change."

"Well, the trick is to remember to take care of yourself as well, so you can continue to love them."

"Okay, Dr. Phil." The both of them laughed just a little bit, but it really lifted Justin's spirit. It was the first time he'd laughed since this had all started, in a time when he truly thought he'd never feel happy again.

"Justin, do you want to know how you can help me now?"

"Yes." Tommy held up both of his wrists and showed Justin the broken chain from the handcuffs hanging from his wrists.

"Woah." Justin said, astounded.

"I broke my chains, now you need to break yours by hanging on." Tommy said, thinking about what he'd said to Justin that night at the hospital. "I was wrong to have said that to you."

"Said what?" Justin asked. They paused for a moment when they thought they heard somebody entering the room, but it was just a gust of wind forcing the corrugated metal roof above them to creak.

"That night when Sarah brought Paige to the hospital and you showed up high."

"Oh, yeah."

Tommy sighed, combing his fingers through his hair nervously. "No matter how angry I may get, I'm still your brother."

"Well, Tommy I know that." Justin sighed. He'd almost forgotten about the horrible predicament Tommy now found himself in.

"Tommy, they fight in duels by fencing." Justin said. "Sword Fighting."

"I know what sword fighting is." Tommy said. "I did fencing in college, remember."

"That's what you meant when you said you were doing fencing?" Justin exclaimed. "I thought you meant you were working with a carpenter or something."

"That, and I used to practice with Dad."

"Tommy, these guys aren't Dad."

"I know."

Justin stared at his brother for a few moments, still trying to digest the idea of Tommy fighting Rabu, who from what he'd heard was very experienced.

"You do realize they could gut you like a fish, right?" Justin asked worriedly. "What about Julia? What about Elizabeth?"

"This isn't about them." Tommy said. "This is about you and me."

"But Tommy-"

"No butts about it." Tommy interrupted. "Besides, Julia wanted to come here to help you, just like I did."

Justin was taken back by this statement. "She did?"

"Of course she did, just like Robert and Scotty did." Tommy answered. "It's the Walker motto - We all stick together, you know that."

"But you left Elizabeth?"

"It was because of Elizabeth that we came." Tommy said. "Remember when she and William were born? Who delivered them?"

Justin's throat tensed as he listened to his brother's words. "Tommy, you know I would have done the same thing for anybody else."

"But you didn't do it for anybody else, you did it for us." Tommy answered. "We lost William because they came too early, but if it hadn't been for you we very well could have lost them both."

"God, Tommy."

"If I didn't at least try to help you and just let you die out here, how could I face her in life somewhere down the road when she asks about you?" Tommy looked Justin in the eye very firmly. "Plus, I'd rather die with my brother than let him die alone like this."

By that point Justin was almost speechless. "Alright, I'm convinced." Justin said.

"Good." Tommy said, searching through the pocket of his jacket. He'd put on this leather coat he'd found at the base because he wasn't sure how cold it got out here at night, and in his pocket was the flask he'd toasted to him with Kevin and Scotty and Robert with earlier. He twisted off the cap and held it over to Justin's mouth. He hesitated at first.

"It's fine, it's just water. With a sigh of relief, he took the first drink of water he'd taken in almost three days.

"Drink it down, all of it." Tommy said, holding the flask to Justin's face until it was empty. After catching his breath, he thought about something for a second.

"It's more about helping the people you love than protecting them, isn't it?"

"Yes." Tommy answered. "That's absolutely correct, but that's only one part of the puzzle. It seems to me you've still got a long way to go."

Justin nodded in understanding. He still felt horrible for the position he'd put his family in, but he now knew how to make it right.

"Don't feel bad, cause it's normal for people to learn about that kind of stuff at different rates." Tommy said. "I'm still kind of behind in the game as well."

Justin believed that, thinking about how his and Julia's marriage almost ended after the loss of their son.

"Justin?" Tommy said. "Rebecca has the ring."

"Really?" He said softly, cracking a smile nervously. "Did she like it?"

"She has it with her right now. She's not wearing it yet, though."

"Why not?"

"She said she wants you to put it on her."

With that statement, Justin felt a glow burn brighter within his heart, no matter how corny that thought sounded to him. He knew he had to fight this, for her, for all of them.

"She needs you, Justin." Tommy said. "She'd probably be lost without you."

Justin didn't know if that was true, but he did know something else was true. He'd be lost without her.

To Be Continued…..


	17. Circumstances of Life

Chapter 17 – Circumstances of Life

The Walkers went through another sleepless night in the desert, still in another, much worse state of shock than before. The minibus remained parked at the side of the road all night. Nora rested against Kitty, who had been drifting in and out of sleep. Those who did get any rest that night didn't get very much. She'd now had a first-hand experience of what Justin had been through many times, and now understood the meaning of defending what you love and who you love in a whole new light. Normally she would have been a nervous wreck and scared out of her mind, but this night was different. She wasn't scared.

"Mom?" Kitty asked from behind her.

"Yes, Kitty?" Nora whispered.

"Is it like you imagined?"

"Yes." Nora imagined, referring to the fighting. "It was terrible."

Kitty closed her eyes once more to listen to the sounds of the desert. It was a different sound, almost eerie. It didn't sound like she was in a country ravaged by a bloody war. If she didn't know any better, she could have been in the Mojave desert or the Sierra Nevadas.

"It was hard." Nora stated, nodding her head.

"But that's the funny thing about today." Kitty said. "It was one of the hardest things I've ever done, and that didn't stop me."

"Yeah." Nora responded. "It didn't stop me either."

Kitty paused for a moment. "Dad would be so proud of you."

"He'd be proud of all of us." Nora said. "This whole time I've been thinking of what he would have done, how he would have reacted to this." She looked up at the stars and the moon, praying and hoping he was really up there, watching over his two boys.

"It's like I said before, Nora." Jadia said from out of the darkness. She was sitting on the floor in the aisle across from Nora and Kitty. "The greatest source of bravery in people is love."

It was then and there that Nora made one of the toughest decisions she'd ever made. She felt her fears leave her body as she made it.

"_From now on, no more Mrs. Nice Mom."_

* * *

Kevin rested his head against the window pane as he sat in his seat. He'd been staring out at the desert, facing the possibility that he might not have brothers anymore. For reasons he didn't understand, he wasn't scared or nervous – he was angry. He was angry that he couldn't stand up and take on life like his brothers or his father did. Today he'd seen a new side of himself. Before the fighting started, he was sure he was going to chicken out or freeze in fear, but he didn't. Out in the desert, when the shooting began, he never hesitated even once. He hadn't forced himself to be brave, it seemed to happen on its own. He didn't understand.

"Kevin." Kevin woke out of his daze, startled by the sharp mentioning of his voice. He looked next to him to see Scotty looking at him. "You've got that look again."

"What look?"

"You know what look I'm talking about." Scotty said to his husband, crossing his arms. "You're confused about life. It's understandable considering what we just did a few hours ago." Kevin rolled his eyes, smiling a little. He wanted to talk about it.

"All my life, for as long as I can remember, whenever I think of bravery I think of Justin and Tommy and my Dad." Kevin said quietly. "But I've never been able to find that strength for myself until today."

Scotty nodded, thinking about what he'd just said. "Maybe you've never had a reason before."

"Trust me, I've had reasons before." Kevin responded. "Coming out was a good enough reason, but I couldn't do it."

Scotty nodded again, remembering back to all the stories Kevin had told him about how hard it had been making that change, especially when it came to his father. He'd never been able to reach that level of a father-son connection with his father before he'd died. That had a profound effect on him. Kevin gazed out the window once more, looking up at the stars and wishing his father was there. There was so much he wanted to tell him, ask him, talk with him about.

"Kevin," Scotty said. "That's called experiencing life. Everybody goes through it."

"Like this?"

"It's different for everybody." Scotty responded. "When I came out, my parents both reacted in ways I still can't get over, but I learned from it. People take life in differently."

Kevin just stared at Scotty, trying his hardest to understand.

"You missed the chance to find your strength in order to reconnect with your Dad, and you apparently know that very well."

"Yes, I do."

"Maybe now that you have the chance to do the same for Justin and Tommy, it's easier because you know the true importance of doing it now."

That must have been it, because it made perfect sense to Kevin. He could think of a lot of times whereas he'd missed finding strength to do the right thing when it would have made a world of difference. Almost every one of those times the result was something bad happening, broken hearts, hurt feelings, things it was very hard and painful for him to think about, that he'd tried so hard to forget.

"How on earth did you get so smart?"

"Oprah." They smiled at each other briefly until Scotty put his arm around Kevin, who in turn rested his head on Scotty's shoulder. He'd really needed that. It was at that moment that he remembered one time where he'd found the courage to do the right thing. He'd found it for Scotty. Of all the guys he'd been with, Scotty was the only one who could draw that fire out of him, that drive that had allowed him to take on Iraqi Militants during a war.

* * *

Throughout the whole night, Sarah had thought about her children, safe and sound back in California with Joe. As she thought of Paige and Cooper, she'd overheard Kevin and Scotty's conversation and realized she had the same problem in finding her own strength. She thought of when she and Joe had started to drift apart, how terrified she was of losing him. Although she had a lot of concern about the children, what scared her the most was the idea of being alone, a fear she'd never even acknowledged the existence of until Paige confronted her with it when Sarah returned that dress. She'd learned two lessons from that experience; that Paige was growing up fast, just like she had, and that fear of the kind of sort she'd carried with her for so long was hurting the people she loved. It had been unfair to both herself and to Joe to have done that. She'd known it was wrong to have done that because of how Rebecca had kissed him, and what he realized afterwards about Sarah. She thought of Kitty, who'd always been able to find the strength to stand up for what she believed in. Many times Sarah had been almost jealous of her little sister for having such courage. She also believed Kitty was whom Justin had gotten his strength from.

Her thoughts then switched back to her two brothers. The thought of never seeing them again terrified her. Like with Kitty, she was proud and at times envious of their courage to take life by the horns. When Justin found out about Joe and Rebecca, he didn't hesitate to do the right thing. Although he didn't always face them in the smartest way, Justin never hesitated in facing problems. When they found out about their Dad and Holly, Justin was the first to look for the truth. When they found out they might have another sibling, Justin was the first to step out to Rebecca, a very smart decision considering how well Rebecca fit in with the Walkers, even though she biologically wasn't a Walker. Tommy also came to mind when she thought about he'd taken his leap of faith into the winery with Holly. He was the risk taker, out of all the Walkers he'd been the most fearless, except for a handful of times in life when it got to be too much, like when he and Julia had lost their son.

Finally, she'd had enough.

"_I have to do this, and I will do it."_

* * *

Julia had spent hours crying until she finally tired herself out. When she woke up, after the sun had gone down, she looked up at the stars. It reminded her of being home, in Arizona. It reminded her of the good times, camping out with her Dad in the desert, midnight road trips, and even nights where she just couldn't sleep. It also reminded her of the awful time she had while she stayed in Phoenix after her son had died. She remembered all the nights she'd crawl out her window after putting Lizzie to bed and sit on the roof, looking at the stars. For the first few nights she sobbed in the darkness, not being able to face the fact that she would never get the chance to see him grow up and have a life of his own. She felt angry with Tommy, but deep down inside she knew it wasn't his fault. That's what got to her. Because she'd been so terrible to him, as had her parents, there were times where she honestly thought things between them would never be the same. Then, when she'd run into her old boyfriend and slept with him, she knew she'd made a terrible mistake. Before long it was being homesick for Los Angeles and missing her husband that finally told her she had to do something. She remembered talking to her parents, assuring them Tommy hadn't caused the problem. She went to see a counselor to help her cope with her grief, and once she was ready, she packed up her things and her daughter and went home.

She sighed quietly as she rubbed her eyes, which were red and raw from all her crying. Every time Elizabeth came to mind, her thoughts drifted back to Justin. She remembered all the times Justin had stumbled in his life, and every time he somehow managed to get back on his feet. Every time he'd taken a wrong turn, he managed to make right of it, just like Tommy did. Those memories brought her no comfort at all, because they then led to the horrible feeling she got in the pit of her stomach when she thought of how he must have suffered during this whole ordeal. Although she still couldn't accept it, she was beginning to understand Tommy's reasons in accepting the militant's challenge. Hopefully, Justin wasn't alone anymore. With that thought, she closed her eyes and prayed for both of them. She knew now that there was no more time left for doubts.

"_I'm coming, I'll be there."_

* * *

Rebecca had been looking at the ring all night long. She'd curled up into a ball on the floor by her seat and had a small flashlight. She'd discovered the inscription on the inside and it made her think of everything they'd been through together in the past two years. Since the moment they'd met she had changed. She remembered how for such a long time she'd been in such a bad way, in school, with her Mom, with everything. Meeting Justin changed everything for her. For the first time in her life she felt she had a real place of belonging. They'd gotten so close so fast as siblings. Then when they found out they weren't siblings, everything took a sudden twist and they then found themselves in something new. It seemed now like she'd completely transformed from who she used to be and formed an entire new Rebecca. It was like God had planned this all along; he had planned for them to meet. To her, she and Justin were like two halves of the same person. She never knew if he felt the same way, but she did know one thing for sure. If Justin died, a part of her would die with him.

"_I'm not giving up."_

To Be Continued…..


	18. A New Journey

Chapter 18 – A New Journey

They were all up the next day before the sun was up. Again they filed their way back down the trail and though the narrow gorge to the old village. It was cooler when they left, but it quickly began to warm up. They had their guns, Rebecca had her bow, and Scotty had the flares. This time they were searching the hideout, looking for a clue to whereas the militants had taken the two missing Walkers. There were only four days left, and now two lives depended on their success.

Robert and Kevin peered into the first building, Kitty behind them. Robert stood ready with his gun as Kevin pulled the red drapes back to reveal nothing but an empty shack. Both men took a sigh of relief seeing the hut was filled with masses of blankets, clothing, and something that smelled like rotting cabbages. Sabriya walked alongside the edge of the building, looking at the plaster on the outside wall. The square indents told her it had been once been covered with tiles, which suggested that it may have been a makeshift temple for whoever lived thee. There were also bullet holes in the wall, like somebody had used the tiles for target practice or something. It made her angry. How could people be so cruel?

Sarah checked the second hut on her own, Nora behind her with a crowbar she'd found in the sand nearby. Nora had changed her look from what it had been like the other day. She'd taken off her jean jacket and replaced it with a vest covered in pockets, like the one Kevin had. She'd gotten a red bandanna from one of the men at the bus and tied it around her forehead. She claimed it kept the sweat out of her eyes, but Sarah hadn't let that stop her from referring to her mother as "Nora MacGyver".

"This building must have been a barn or something." Robert said, peeking between them. "I can smell donkeys."

Sarah inhaled a few times before turning to Robert. "Are you sure that's not you?" Robert glared at her humorously as he and Kitty continued onto the next building.

"Sarah, now is not the time to worry about Hygiene." Nora said sternly as she quickly ran to catch up with them. Sarah stood there for a second, peering into the room and thinking; _"There's a sentence I thought I'd never hear her say."_

Scotty and Julia checked the fourth building, which must have been their control station or something, because there was bits and pieces of computer equipment everywhere. There were coils of extra cable, broken disk fragments, and tower housing everywhere across the tile floor. Scotty pawed through a pile of papers that had been left on the fold out table in the room. Everything was in Arabic text, which didn't help anything, and a lot of it was printed on cheap paper that was thin and made the ink bleed in the hear. By the time Scotty was finished, his palms were black with ink. The last building Robert and Kitty checked must have been their food storage, as empty boxes and cans from food containers were scattered everywhere.

"All Clear." Robert said to the group, raising his hand and signaling to everybody the area was cleared. Except for the four dozen or so dead bodies littering the paths through the village, nobody was left. Nothing was left.

Rebecca stood near the center of the village. She turned to look at the large stone pump house. She saw something was different now. She hadn't seen Jadia in a while, and the door was open. Carefully, she walked over to the building, bow in hand. She opened the door slowly and looked into the darkness. She could hear something. She slowly walked down the hallway, and as she came closer, she heard a crying child. She turned the corner and saw Jadia sitting cross legged underneath a lit fluorescent light. Jadia looked up at Rebecca.

"He was here." She said, her eyes full of tears. "I can smell him."

"Smell him?" Rebecca asked. Then she inhaled and smelled something very familiar. There was a faint scent of his cologne was in the air. She'd recognize that scent anywhere. Rebecca looked again at the girl, and slowly sat down aside from her. She looked at Jadia in that same understanding way Justin had looked at her in the past.

"He saved my life." Jadia said softly. "Those men attacked our village one day. There was a lot of gunfire, more than usual. I'd left my school and was on my way back to the orphanage at lunchtime to change my clothes. I had spilled ink on my shirt. I tried to run, but then I saw that big car coming at me I couldn't move. Justin ran at me, almost flying when he snatched me off the ground. In the gunfire he threw himself over me. He protected me."

That sounded like Justin. He'd take a bullet for anybody, something Rebecca both loved and hated about him. But now she'd found a new understanding to Justin's behavior. He was twenty-nine years old and had lived a great deal of life. Jadia was barely twelve-years old and still had her whole life ahead of her. She continued to listen to Jadia talk.

"I hate the war." She said. "My whole family, my mother, father, my two brothers, my grandmother, they are all gone."

Rebecca gasped. She hadn't known that.

"Sabriya is the closest thing I have to family. All of her family is gone too."

Rebecca looked at Jadia's face. "Both of you were very brave to try to help him."

Jadia cracked a smile at the comment. "He loves you." She said, looking at Rebecca. "He mentioned you a lot."

Rebecca thought about what her thoughts had been the previous night. If these two girls, both barely half her age, could act with such courage, then she herself could act with it as well.

Then, there was a high pitched scream coming from outside.

"That's Sabriya!" Jadia cried. She jumped to her feet and ran out of the room. Rebecca quickly grabbed her bow and followed.

Outside, near the second building, Sabriya had walked past a dead body and the man, who was barely still alive, grabbed her foot as she walked by. Scotty and Robert gently dragged him from the building edge where he'd been shot. He was talking quickly and weakly in Arabic, and Sabriya was listening to him.

"Don't shoot him!" Sabriya cried. "He says he knows where they have gone!"

Everybody gasped. Jadia ran through the crowd and kneeled next to the man, Rebecca joining the group. "Jadia, he says he knows!"

The two girls listened to him speak for a few moments.

"North of here," Jadia began. "Beyond the Alluvial Plains."

"In the mountains!" Sabriya continued.

"Mountains?" Kitty asked.

"He says he is a bread maker from a village near here." Jadia said in a surprised tone. "He knew somehow that they had captured an American and tried to help."

The group of Americans looked at the man. They were beginning to learn a lot from Iraq and about its people. The people were just as diverse in mind here as they were in America. They watched for a few more moments, then the two girls gasped simultaneously. They paused for a few moments more.

"He's at peace." Jadia said softly. Robert looked back to where he'd been and saw a large red spot in the sand. He said a prayer in his mind before Jadia interrupted.

"They have gone to the mines at Rakula." Jadia said. "Near the Iranian border."

"Mines?" Robert asked. "I never heard of Iraq going into mining very much." He knew that in Iraq that aside from salt and phosphate, not much mining was done for minerals, just a few operations here and there. Mostly what they drilled for was oil.

"A long time ago, back when the English people ruled the country, they took large teams of workers into the mountains, looking for Iron." Jadia said. "They dug many tunnels and caves looking for metal, but finding only rock. After Iraq was made free, the mines were abandoned."

"That is where they have gone." Sabriya added. "He said that they work independent from other militant groups, and many of their fighters have died in the war."

"But many are still left in the mountains." Jadia said. "And when the Day of Judgment comes, your other son will fight them. If he wins they will release them."

The Walkers looked in Silence. Rakula was over 100 miles away, and time was running out.

"Well, I guess that's that then." Nora said, walking back towards where the minibus was.

"Mom, where are you going?" Sarah asked.

"I've told you many times where I am going." She answered sternly. "I am going to get my boys."

"Nora, wait!" Robert called. "We can't just barge into this anymore."

"Why the hell not."

"Now that they know we are here and were able to find them, they'll probably expect us to come and find them."

"Yeah, Mom." Kitty added. "They'll have people looking for us."

"We need to come up with a plan on how to do this."

"There's no time!" Nora snapped.

"Mom! Mom, calm down." Kevin said, walking towards her and taking her in his arms. "We'll find them, don't worry."

Nora hugged her son back, not caring that he was drenched with sweat and smelled horrible. They would find them. They had to.

To Be Continued…..


	19. Into the Wilderness

Chapter 19 – Into the Wilderness

"I'm not sure if this is a logical idea." Bryan said with his arms crossed.

"It's the only way we can do this." Robert persisted. "We need to go it alone." The group had gathered back at the bus and had requested they make the trip to Rakula in the north. "If they can make it in and out of the United States without being detected, who knows what they're capable of."

"But if we can't catch them, what makes you think you can?" Erik asked. "Average civilians wouldn't know how to handle themselves in your situation."

"Well, in case you haven't noticed, we aren't average civilians." Kitty barked. Both army personnel paused for a moment.

"Look," Robert continued. "Two lives are hanging on this now, and one of them happens to be the father of a toddler."

That hit both men very hard. Both of them had children and were equally shocked at the sacrifice Tommy Walker had made for his brother. They were also very well aware of the trouble this could cause with the military. Finally, Erik came up with a solution. He dug around in the plastic tote full of gear and found a two way radio. "I think this one might work better than the others."

"We can't." Kevin added. "They'll pick up the waves." Erik responded by flipping open a plastic cover on the bottom of the radio and pulling the battery out. "Now they can't."

Robert nodded slowly with a grin. "Clever."

"Well, gents, I guess we're not needed here anymore." Bryan said as he took the pieces for the radio and handed them to Scotty, who in turn put them into a plastic bag he had, rolled it up, and tucked it in the pocket to his pants. The eight of them watched as the bus headed down the road and out of sight. As they watched, they could see Jadia and Sabriya running up the road.

"They're still there! They're still there!" They shouted.

* * *

Roughly one mile down the road from their village, Jadia and Sabriya had come across an old man and his two sons who raised horses. They could be seen galloping around the large fenced-in pasture near the old man's home. While Robert and Kevin attempted to barter with the old man, the rest of the group watched the horses. Most of them were black or dark brown, with long manes and tails. "I think they're Stallions." Sarah commented.

"Look at how they run together, like they're in a flock or something." Kitty added. "To think something so beautiful could be found out in the middle of the desert." Nora smiled as she glanced back at her son and son-in-law nervously. She'd heard some loud voices coming from over there. Jadia was interpreting the old man's Arabic language into English.

"He says he wants $500 for seven of the fastest horses." Jadia said, listening to the man's bickering. Robert pulled out the $100 bill he'd kept in his wallet for emergencies, and Kevin pulled out another hundred. After a moment's haste. Robert unfastened his gold watch, which he saw catch the man's eye almost instantly, and laid it on top of the bills. Although pleased, the man's face was still firm.

"He says he wants more." Jadia said nervously, looking up at Robert. Neither he or Kevin had anything else of value to give him. Julia could hear the talking and quickly turned from the fence, marching over to the man. As she walked, her hands crept up behind her neck and she unclipped the chain for her cross. As she took her necklace in her hands, her hands trembled as she slowly slid her wedding ring off and held both pieces of jewelry in her hands.

"Excuse me, boys." Julia said as she squeezed in between Kevin and Robert and placed almost $1,500 worth of jewelry on the table by the old man's house. His eyes lit up and he gave them an open smile, exposing his toothless grin.

"He says it's a deal!" Jadia squealed as the man shouted something in Arabic to his two adult sons. They took off in an instant on their own horses into the field, rounding up seven of their fastest Stallions and leading them to the wooden barn at the edge of the field. A few minutes later, the boys came out leading four of the horses to the Walkers. They'd fitted the horses with hand made leather saddles and bits. He and Kevin each took two of the horses, bowing their heads in gratitude shortly before the two boys ran back for the other three. As he turned around, Robert saw Julia walk back to Scotty and the other women.

Nora quickly wrapped her arms around Julia.

"It's okay, Nora. It's fine." Julia said, returning the hug. "We're going to find them."

"I know." Nora responded. "I just know how much those meant to you."

"They didn't mean as much to me as Tommy or Justin."

Sarah and Kitty smiled with remorse as they both gave her a big sister group hug. As they did, Julia looked back and saw Rebecca, holding the ring box from Justin in her hand.

"No way in hell were you going to sell yours." Julia said to Rebecca.

"Thanks." Rebecca said with a smile. As she put the Ring box away, Robert and Scotty arrived with the first four horses. Nora took the first one, which was dark brown with a white spot on the forehead. She'd volunteered to share with Rebecca, who'd never been horseback riding before. Sarah took the second one, which was pure black with a gray mane. She was relieved when she saw the saddle had straps along the side, which she slid her gun into, locking it beforehand. Kitty took the one she would share with Robert, which was one of the biggest horses. It was black and tall, with a solid black mane and a white stripe going down the snout. Julia took the last one, which was a bit lighter brown colored than Nora's horse, with a black mane. After she took the reigns, she slid both her pistols and the rest of her things into the holders on one side and the large pouch on the other. As she mounted the horse, she remembered taking horseback riding lessons in Arizona during High School.

Scotty ran over to Kevin and Robert, who had the last three horses. Kevin gave one of the reigns of the horses to Scotty, giving him the claim to another dark black horse. Kevin's was a very dark brown, almost black in color. Both had dark manes and the same saddles, which they both began loading their things into. Scotty had three signal flares left in a plastic gun he'd gotten from the base at Mosul, and he put them in the pouch with the bag containing the Radio. As he and Scotty both mounted the horses, Kevin took hold of the reigns and gently tapped his heels into the horse's ribs. Both horses moved with such agility that when they stopped near the rest of the group, Scotty nearly fell forwards off the horse. Sarah had mounted hers, Nora was up on hers, helping Rebecca fasten her bow on the saddle before helping her climb up. Kitty had already fastened both hers and Robert's guns to the side of the saddle and she stood by the horse, watching Robert Lift Jadia onto the last horse. She quickly took the reigns in one hand and looked her map in the other hand. The sun was still high in the sky as Robert lifted Sabriya onto the horse, resting her behind Jadia. Jadia quickly handed the map to Sabriya, who'd fished out a compass from her backpack that she'd gotten from their school. While the two girls figured out their course, Robert walked over to Kitty and gently put his arms around her. It was the third time he'd paused to hold her today, after seeing Julia and Rebecca he realized how lucky he was to still be able to do that. She rested her head against his chest, feeling his shirt was drenched with sweat. She didn't care though. She couldn't. After a few moments, Robert released her from his arms and turned to mount the horse. She'd combined his laptop and a few more of his things into her knapsack and slung it over her shoulders. She looked up and saw Robert extending his hand to her. She graciously took it and she pulled herself onto the horse's back, sitting behind him. She put her hands on his shoulders, but after a moment she took her hands off and wiped them on her cargo shorts because of the sweat.

"Sorry, Kitty." He muttered.

"Oh, that's okay." She sighed. The sight of his bare arms usually made her feel a little light headed, but at that moment she felt as though she'd float right off the horse. She knew it wasn't the right time though.

"Okay, we need to go that way first!" Jadia shouted, pointing to the north.

"Are you sure you two can ride that by yourselves?" Kevin asked.

"Yes." They both said as they both bumped their heels and their horse began galloping in a semicircle before Jadia loosened her grip on the reigns. The horse took off across the sand towards the hills to the North.

"Hiya! Hiya!" Nora barked as she took the reigns and tapped her heels firmly. Rebecca tightened her grip around Nora's waist as the horse gained speed. She looked back to see Sarah and Julia following, side by side. Next, Kevin and Scotty took off across the desert, riding again side by side. Kitty began to tighten her grip on Robert's shoulders while he put on his sunglasses. "Kitty, you're going to go flying off this thing once we get going." He said, taking her hands in his and wrapping his arms around his stomach. A second later he clicked his tongue twice and the horse began galloping across the desert. Now she was fighting off that light headed feeling of hers, which wasn't easy with her pressing her hands into his six pack.

* * *

Jadia and Sabriya led the team up into the rocky hills , passed the abandoned village and into the rocky valley below. They carefully wound their way through hills and across valleys, leaving clouds of dust and sand in their wake. The terrain of Iraq was very barren, signs of life were few and the ones they did see provided no comfort. At one location the white form of a human skeleton caught everybody's eyes, but didn't phase the horses. Jadia had traded her sneakers for a larger map of Iraq, which Sabriya navigated through behind her carefully, making sure not to drop the map or the compass. Pressing the map against Jadia's back, Sabriya marked out their progress with a pencil, stopping periodically. Every time they stopped, she would pull out a blue scarf and wave it behind her, signaling for the others to slow down. After an four hours they'd gone almost 35 miles, zigzagging their way around villages and roads as not to be spotted. Militant groups commonly had connections everywhere, so they couldn't risk it. Finally , at sundown they came to a large grassy plain. As they slowed down and overlooked the view from what was apparently a large bluff. Within their sights was a long river flowing through a large valley.

"Euphrates." Jadia whispered loudly. They stood there, mounted on their horses as they watched the sun slowly sink beneath the horizon.

* * *

Within sight of the river, the team set up a makeshift camp shielded within a small cluster of fig trees atop the bluff. The moon was getting fuller, Kitty noted to herself as she looked up through the branches and leaves. She'd laid therein the soft sand, too exhausted to move. Deep circles had formed under eyes and she'd dozed off twice sine laying down barely two hours ago. Nearby, Robert had his laptop open, and was looking at the video. He could see both Justin and Tommy, but didn't let anybody see it. He just checked to make sure it was recording live, then quickly closed his laptop and slid it back into Kitty's bag. He quickly turned to his wife, who he saw was awake and looking up at the stars. Her eyes were glossy and her hair messy laying in the sand.

"Kitty?" He whispered. "Are you alright?"

She nodded her head. "I'm just thinking about things."

"Like what?" He asked. "Your brothers, I'm assuming."

"Yeah." She said, never taking her eyes off of the stars. "When I lived in New York, whenever I thought about either one of them, or Kevin or Sarah or my parents, I'd go up to the roof of my building and lay down on a blanket and look at the stars."

His throat tensed, as he could tell she was hiding how she really felt. He could always tell because of this certain look on her face.

"Kitty-"

"Please don't." Kitty said. "I'm sorry, but I was just thinking about my Dad, and I was telling him in my mind to please watch over them."

Robert continued to listen as Kitty continued to talk, still gazing at the stars. "I told him that if they were up there with him, or if he did meet them within the next few days, I asked him to hell them I loved them." She said before tears began flooding her eyes slowly. Robert gently took her in his arms and scooted over next to her. She cried into his shirt softly as he reached for his jacket nearby and covered her with it. She hadn't slept in days and he was beginning to worry, but one he heard her soft snoring, he breathed a sigh of relief once she was asleep. Now it was his turn as he rolled a shirt up with one hand and tucked it under his head and tried desperately to sleep. His arms and legs ached tremendously and he really wanted the rest, but his mind kept switching to Justin and Tommy.

* * *

Kevin was standing guard, his eyes tirelessly focused on the dark shadows of the line of trees surrounding the field. Holding his gun in his hands, he looked to the Northwest, up the river and he could see the lights of Baghdad. Earlier in the night he'd heard faint rumbling in the distance, and deep down inside he knew what it was. He'd heard all about the war on the news, from work, everywhere. Now he was seeing it with his own two eyes and it wasn't what he thought it was.

"Kevin?" A familiar voice came from behind him. He turned to see Scotty behind him, holding a hot dog rolled up in a slice of bread that came from a smashed loaf. "Dinner is served."

Kevin sighed a small breath of relief. He'd been running on empty all day. "Thanks."

The two of them stood in silence for a few moments.

"I keep hoping this is a dream." Kevin said, taking a bite out of his hot dog. "I keep wishing I'll wake up and we'll all be home safe and sound."

"I bet that's what all the soldiers here are wishing." Scotty said.

"They're all just doing their jobs." Kevin said, yawning. "This is on a more personal level."

There was another moment of silence between the two of them. Scotty could tell right away Kevin was freaking out more than he was showing.

"Kevin, we're going to find them." Scotty said, putting his hand on his husband's shoulder.

"It's always been us three guys." Kevin said softly. "Now I'm the only one left."

"Kevin, you're talking as if they're already dead." Scotty said. "Have some faith, dammit."

"I do have faith," Kevin started. "It's just hard to believe this is happening."

"Life never works out the way we plan." Scotty said, crossing his arms. "The two of us should know that quite well."

"True." Kevin looked at his spouse, who he could tell was tired. "Why don't you get some sleep and I'll see you in the morning."

"Okay." Scotty said, yawning. They kissed quickly and Scotty turned back inside towards the camp, leaving Kevin to finish his dinner and stand guard. He approached the fire they'd built in the center of the trees. It was small so they wouldn't be spotted by anybody. The horses were tied to a tree nearby and they were unloaded of their burdens. The saddles were piled against a tree and all of their belongings were piled by the fire. Rebecca slept soundly against one side of the pile, Julia against the other, and they were both using clothing as blankets. Across the fire from them, Sabriya and Jadia were fast asleep, curled up in their only blanket, a large afghan that had been on one of the horses under the saddle. Sarah curled up underneath her coat nearby, and Nora was awake. She watched as Scotty crept over to his spot in the circle around the fire, pulled a shirt over himself, and laid down in the sand, falling asleep in minutes. Nora looked at them, and then looked up at the stars in the sky. A tear slowly rolled down the side of her face as she slowly began falling asleep.

"_Please watch over them."_

To Be Continued…..


	20. Enough

Chapter 20 – Enough

The Eleventh day since the ordeal had began in the Middle East for the Walker Family had been spent in two extremely painful ways for both the eldest and youngest of William and Nora Walker's sons. One of them had been forced at gunpoint into a ten mile march through a desolate mountain pass, while the other was in the hands of a tribe of Sunni militants. For over 14 hours, thirty-seven year old Tommy Walker was marched through the hills and canyons of a mountain range. The heat had been unbearable as the sun reflected off many smooth rock faces, the thin air making it impossible to breathe in some spots. The sweat stung at his eyes and his legs throbbed as he watched the sun pass by ever so slowly overhead. The heat made his mind into a whirlpool of thoughts, bouncing from his wife and daughter, to his mother, his two sisters and other brother and their spouses, still out there somewhere in a country ravaged by a bloody war, and his throat tightened as he thought of his youngest brother. Justin had been to hell and back more times than most people had been in their entire lives, and all before he was barely thirty years old. He couldn't stand imagining Justin alone with those men, but that didn't stop him.

Sunburned and dehydrated, Tommy was pushed back into that same cell at the end of the day. All they'd given him that day was two bottles of water, both were luke warm. He'd drank one for himself and saved the other one for Justin. As the men dragged him inside, the shouting from the men and the sudden change in exposure to light hit him like a crowbar after a long day in the heat. He hit the floor of the cell hard, hearing the door clang shut and the men walking away, speaking in Arabic. After his vision cleared and his ears stopped ringing, his attention focused back onto his brother. As soon as he opened his eyes, he froze dead in his tracks when he saw blood on the floor.

"Justin!" He snapped, his voice hoarse from the heat. He crawled over to his brother, who was still tied up, laying face down on the ground. Tommy gently rolled him over onto his side and saw the extent of the damage that had been done that day. His lip had been split open and he was missing three teeth, and the wound on his forehead was now joined by a black eye and three cuts on his forehead, just above his eyebrow. He was unconscious, so Tommy gently shook his shoulder to wake him up.

"Justin, Wake up!"

After a few shakes, Justin let out a few small coughs before cracking his eyes open.

"Tommy?" He said in a dazed tone. "Where have you been? Where did they take you?"

"Don't ask." Tommy said, wincing at the stinging of the skin on his face, his neck, and his arms. He twisted off the cap to the other bottle of water and held it to Justin's mouth. He gagged slightly over the warm water, but Tommy never let him waste one drop. "What did they do to you?"

"I remember being hit in the face hard with something." Justin moaned, tugging gently at the cords binding his hands together. "My head is killing me right now." It wasn't until that moment that he noticed the trembling. He took a deep breath as he gently rested his palm on Justin's forehead.

"Oh, God." Tommy said, Justin looking at him with a confused look. "You're burning up." Tommy scrambled to look for his jacket, which he found kicked to the side of the room. He quickly grabbed it and draped it over his brother. He could tell Justin's condition was worsening rapidly, and that if this fever got worse, he might not live long enough to see the duel that could be the difference between life and death for both of them. Tommy glanced out the window at the darkening sky. He prayed silently and swiftly as he took off his collared shirt, even though it was drenched with sweat.

"Tommy?"

Tommy looked up after draping his shirt over his brother.

"The pains are almost gone." He said in a clearer voice. "Nothing hurts as bad as it did before."

"Justin." Tommy said crossly. "You're a terrible liar."

Justin sighed, wincing a small bit. He did admit he was in some pain, but it wasn't as bad as it had been before. It may have been because he'd just gotten so used to it, or maybe he was just delusional over his condition. "I mean it, Tommy." He said again.

Tommy was close to losing his mind at that point in time. It was like a nightmare he wish he'd tried to throw himself off of a cliff to wake up from.

"Tommy, Look at me." Justin suddenly said in the stern tone of voice their father used to use when he needed to get a point across. Blinking back a few small tears, he brought himself to face his brother.

"I'm not scared." He said. "To be honest, I never have been."

Tommy glared at him, shocked and surprised at that comment. "What?"

"Do you remember what Dad used to tell us whenever we got scared or nervous about something?"

"Conquer it before it conquers you?" Tommy responded, quoting his father.

"Well, that too," Justin continued. William Walker used many quotes to teach his children morals, but Justin thought of the one single moral that had been stuck in his mind for the past two weeks. Although he did admit he'd gotten a bit confused along the way, he did know one thing he felt he'd done right for a change. "He said to me once that life is like war."

Tommy never remembered those words coming from his father, but Justin remembered them clear as day. He'd hold Justin that shortly after he enlisted, hoping the military would give his life that structure it desperately needed. "He said that because like war, life is unpredictable, you never know what's going to happen the next day, or if there even is going to be a next day." Justin said, his voice growing softer. Drips of sweat had started forming on his forehead as he battled his fever from inside his mind. "I just wish that it hadn't taken me so long to understand fully."

Tommy looked down at his brother and realized that this was a new side of his little brother that he'd never seen before. In a way, he knew that Justin was very well capable of beating any challenge life threw at him, just like all the Walkers did in their own way. Their Mom faced the reality that her husband of almost 40 years had not one but two affairs; Sarah watched her marriage collapse and now battled with the idea of being a single parent; Kitty had witnessed one of the world's worst disasters and taken the biggest dive into politics, even for her; Kevin had faced scrutiny for being gay and had done something most gay people might never get the chance to do; and Tommy had followed in his father's footsteps and created a business for himself and his family. Now Justin had taken on a challenge few people actually experienced, and there he was walking through fire.

"You know, that night at the hospital." Tommy said gently, rubbing the back of his head. "That was a point where I screwed up. Everybody does it at some point in their lives.

Justin hesitated as he came up with an answer to that remark. He clearly understood the words that had just come out of his mouth, and was sure that he believed they were true. "I'd rather face Al Wasli than spend the rest of my life living in fear of him." Justin said, looking Tommy square in the eye. "I'm not dead yet, and neither are you."

"Justin-"

"You were right." Justin interrupted. "Fighting for family is more sensible than dying for family. We've both got hell of good reasons for fighting."

Tommy didn't respond to that comment, not verbally anyway. He sat there, looking at Justin, who eventually slipped out of consciousness and fell asleep. He looked around at the darkness and didn't see or hear anything. He also saw that the camera was gone. He remembered seeing it recording them the night before. The hours passed slowly as he sat there in the darkness, occasionally glancing through the bars at the clear sky. The same thoughts of his family came into his mind. At that moment, he knew Justin was right. He'd had enough of the fear and of the pain. He'd had enough.

Tommy slowly rose to his feet, holding his breath and listening to the sounds of the night. Taking deep breaths, he closed his eyes and visualized his sword. It was a Japanese sword he'd bought in college, and his father had taught him fencing. The two of them had mock duels all the time, and he'd one second place in a fencing tournament three years in a row when he was in college. Playing football gave him the speed he needed, and Skateboarding and Snowboarding gave him the precision he'd needed. He visualized himself in the last duel he'd had against his father, which had been about two months before he died. William had kept an antique sword from when he'd fought in Korea and used it in every duel. Within moments he'd made up his mind; he'd either live the rest of his life alongside his brother, or he'd die fighting for it.

To Be Continued…..


	21. Rising

Chapter 21 – Rising

Through the twelfth day and into the thirteenth, the Walkers made their way across a country none of them had ever thought they'd see – at least at that time anyway. They'd rode their horses through the shallow waters of both the Euphrates and the Tigris rivers. Winding their way around the irrigation ditches and marshes with the tall grass. Earlier that morning they'd had quite a scare then gunfire was heard about a mile from the trail they were on, which wound it's way across the plains and hills towards the north. Before long, the hazy silhouettes began appearing in the distance.

"There they are." Jadia said softly, pointing to the large shapes. "In those mountains."

Robert took a deep breath as he stared at them for a moment. They looked to be about 20 or 30 miles away, and rose gradually as they went further inland from the Persian Gulf, rising to higher peaks off in the far distance. He and Kitty had pulled ahead of the group and rode aside Jadia and Sabriya. The night before they had camped in a secluded marsh along the banks of the Tigris, watching the flat-bottom boats glide past in the moonlight.

That night, Rebecca barely slept at all. When she did sleep, she dreamed of Justin. He was there with them, kneeling beside her. He was dressed in his uniform and had his gun in his hand. He didn't say anything, but just stood there and stared at her. She reached out for him, and as she did, she blinked. When her vision cleared, he was gone. Nora was awake when Rebecca suddenly awoke from her dream, hyperventilating and pale as stone. She'd spent the rest of the night in Nora's arms, drifting in and out of sleep, trying to rest. Now, Rebecca had fallen asleep twice against Nora's back as they rode across the desert.

Julia wasn't having as hard of a time dealing with the situation, but was choking over another fear. Although she was terrified over the thought of being a Widow, it didn't stop her from retaining her focus. She thought about Tommy almost every waking moment, finding herself on a mission to abide to the request he'd given her. His soft words repeated in her mind frequently, scaring her by forcing her to think they might very well have been the last word's she'd ever hear from him. _"Be Brave, Be Brave."_ His voice repeated in her mind. She wasn't angry at what he'd done, she was angry at the situation. How could this have happened? She'd been thinking of it ever since the night it started. She wasn't angry at Justin either, she couldn't be. He'd saved a child's life, and as a mother she was proud of him as well. She was angry at the war nobody seemed to want. Coming to Iraq and listening to Jadia and Sabriya talk about it had given her a whole new outlook on the war then she'd gotten from watching it on TV. She wasn't scared or angry because she knew about what militant groups like this were capable of. She remembered she was at work when she saw on TV in the break room on CNN when a kidnapped soldier was executed in a video. Now both her husband and brother-in-law were facing the same thing.

Robert rode alongside Jadia, leading the group northwards to the mountains. All he could think of was how brave these two had been. Here, two twelve-year-olds had taken on obstacles most adults never even attempted to face.

"Mr. McAllister?" Jadia asked.

"Yes?" Robert responded.

"In America, do they think all of us hate them?"

Robert hesitated at answering that, but didn't want to lie to her either. "Yes." He said solemnly. "A lot of people think everybody here does."

"But, at the same time," Nora interrupted from behind them. "A lot of people don't. I've always known no matter where you go, not everybody is going to think or act alike. They might to certain degrees, but they can still think for themselves."

"That's right, Nora." Robert added, looking back to Nora, then to Jadia again. He could tell she was becoming nervous, as was Sabriya.

"You know, it's okay to be scared." Robert said softly, looking at the two girls as they looked back at him in confusion.

"How, Why?" Jadia asked puzzled.

"Think of it as the first step-a stepping stone of sorts." Robert said, his voice labored. "It pushes you towards the next step."

"What's the next step?" Sabriya asked.

"Taking action." Robert responded. In his own mind, his memories were bouncing back almost 20 years, to the Gulf War. He thought about the helicopter crash. He remembered the look on the pilot's face, and in his eyes. He remembered seeing determination, the kind that cannot be shaken off or discouraged by anything easily. "There are two choices in the second step; you can go forward or you can go back."

Jadia didn't quite understand it, but she did understand what she wanted to do.

"I want to go forward." She said. "I want to find them"

Robert smiled at them to give them reassurance. "We will. We will."

They rode in much silence for the rest of the day, and by the time the evening came around, they noticed the horses were going slower and their breathing became labored. The air was getting thinner as they ascended up into the hills before the mountains. Already, large rock formations of black, red, and brown stone were protruding from the earth. There were no trees, no signs of human life anywhere. The gravel road had not been used much since the British Occupation. Kitty had read about Iraq's political history, and was familiar with a few industries they had brought to the middle east. She'd seen pictures of tunnels and mammoth caves being cut into the rock as they checked for mineral deposits. Along the path, the only trace of human activity they could see at that point, they came to a large rock wall rising from the ground. Beyond it, they saw how the landscape changed as large rocky hills rose from the desert and towards the sky. Kevin spotted a cave nearby, where they found a small underground spring, that trickled a small amount of water from the higher elevations and dumped it into a shallow pool on the floor of the cave. Jadia laid her map down on the floor of the cave as the Walkers quickly circled around her. She found where they were on the map, roughly 7 or 8 miles from where the old mine was. Sarah kneeled beside her with a flashlight, shining it dimly onto the map, as the sun was going down now. They had officially entered the mountain range, and from there they'd have to go on foot, because the paths were not cleared well enough for the horses to travel on. In addition to that, the horses weren't used to the altitude and probable wouldn't be able to adjust to the thin air. The group would have to go the rest of the way on their own. After finding the water was clean, Nora and Kitty quickly filled their water bottles as the others unloaded all their weapons off of the horses.

"Scotty, do you still have the radio?" Robert whispered, putting on his brown leather coat as it began to get colder.

"Yeah." Scotty answered, tapping the bulge in the pocket of the cargo jeans he was wearing. The army had plenty of them and had given each one of them at least one pair. They were worn by people doing undercover patrolling, and were good to use at night because of their neutral tones. They'd also been given dark grey denim jackets, which they'd each kept tightly rolled up in their bags, as instructed. The worn look was also a bit harder to make out at night. While the others got ready, Sarah had beaten them to that stage and was now standing near the face of the cave. After a moment, Nora joined her.

"I'm starting to understand why he never talked about this place." Sarah said softly but firmly, holding her gun in one hand and standing it beside her. Nora looked at her daughter's face and noticed how much she looked like her father.

"You have his war face." Nora said. "You're probably going to need it."

A few moments later, the team filed out of the cave. They'd tied their horses up inside of the cave before heading back to the opening in the rock face they'd come to. Robert lead the line, with Jadia at his side. Kitty followed with Sabriya, followed by Nora, Rebecca, Julia, Sarah, Scotty, and Kevin. When they came to the opening in the rock, something already stood out to them, even in the increasing darkness.

"This was manmade." Kitty stated, pointing to the sides of the ramp that had been cut through the rock up to the next elevation level. "The rock was blown out." Both sides of the ramp had some areas where the wall had been smoothed down, but there were other areas with large dents protruding further into the wall. As they walked, flashlights dimly in hand, Rebecca noticed something else in the rock. "Wait, stop!" She whispered sharply as she stopped and crouched down. One by one, everybody stopped, trying to be silent and keeping their flashlights low as Rebecca slowly pushed away at the large amount of sand and debris that had piled up over the years. After a moment of digging, she found a long metal object running up and down the ramp from the mountains back towards the desert. "They're railroad tracks." She said, looking up at the group. Robert and Kitty now could see the thin outline of two steel girders underneath the rubble. They poked out at some areas, but the tracks could be seen going up into the hills. Jadia looked at her map and saw where they were, and where the mine was. She noticed there was a thin dotted line connecting the two points.

"If the tracks turn to the left at the top of the ramp, then the path marked on the map shows where the rail lines once were." The team continued up to the north. "Yes, they do turn." Robert told Jadia, then stopping to dig for something in his pack quickly.

"Robert, what are you doing?" Kitty asked. Before he could answer, he pulled out another piece of gear he'd been able to track down. The group watched as he pulled an old helmet from his pack and mounted it on his head. He then flipped a funny shaped contraption from the visor and what came together was a pair of night vision goggles. Jadia and Sabriya looked at the funny machine in amazement, but the others just stared for a few moments.

"Where did you get that?" Kitty whispered.

"At the base." Robert answered. "They're the same kind as the ones I used in the gulf.

Kitty scoffed and crossed her arms. "Pardon, have we met?"

"This was the only one they were willing to give us." Robert said, turning them on and stepping back as his eyes adjusted to the light from the cameras. "This isn't the time to whine, Kitty." He looked at the team once more, took Jadia behind him, and slowly began following the tracks into the mountains. Kitty followed with Sabriya, her gun still in her hands. Nora took a deep breath to settle her nerves as she continued walking. Rebecca followed, her Quiver over her shoulder and her arrow mounted on her arm, arrow ready. Julia had her pistols tucked in her belt as she followed, Sarah had her gun over her shoulder.

"Hey, watch that thing!" Scotty snipped that thing as he ducked just before Sarah hit him in the forehead with it.

"Oh, sorry." She whispered as she began walking in a quiet march. Scotty and Kevin both looked out over the darkening desert and the orange sunset, which was beginning to fade into a deep red.

"Go ahead, Scotty." Kevin said, motioning for Scotty to go ahead of him. "I'll cover the rear."

Scotty said nothing, but just leaned over and kissed him quickly before joining the line. Kevin took one last deep breath of his own and started walking thinking of the possible outcomes. He'd either come out with two brothers, come out as an only son, or not come out at all. Either way, he was going in.

To Be Continued…..


	22. Revelations

Chapter 22 – Revelations

By the third day, Tommy had grown a little used to the heat. Growing up in Southern California helped a little bit, but not by much. The soles of his leather shoes were beginning to disappear from beneath him, and the legs of his jeans were beginning to tear at the sleeves. The men guarding him muttered things he couldn't understand. The only word he could make out was "American" and twice it had followed with a spit to the ground. After a while, he began to notice something rather odd about his captors. They were different than the people he'd been looking at in Iraq since his arrival. As he walked, he casually glanced back at them without moving his head more than in an inch or so. The way they said "American" sounded different from the way Jadia and Sabriya and all the other Arabs they'd meet said it. It sounded strange to him, but in a way, very familiar.

As the minutes ticked by, he'd listened to their conversation. Before long, it was all coming back to him. The dialect did sound familiar as a few words came back into his mind. It had been almost 20 years since he'd heard them, but they were suddenly fresh in his mind, and that's when it hit him. They weren't Arabs, not even close. They were _Russians_!

He'd tried his hardest to forget, just in case it would ever come back to cause trouble. It was a secret he'd carried with him for many years. He'd never told his brothers, his sisters, his mother, not even Julia. His father was the only one who knew about it. His thoughts sent him back to the winter of 1987. From November of 1987 to January of 1991, He'd been in a place that reminded him very much of his current situation. Tommy had graduated from High School early and with his father, arranged for him to take his wishes of pursuing an education in Business to an entirely different level, just like Sarah had. Although Sarah had gotten her Masters from two of the top schools of business in both the United States and the United Kingdom, Tommy had taken his education from a place farther to the east. He'd attended three consecutive terms at the Plekhanov Academy of Economics in Moscow. Like Justin, Tommy had also faced war, only indirectly, because not even the last years of the Cold War wasn't going to stop him. It was tricky to pull off, but he made it there. He'd had to learn Russian in order to understand his professors, one of whom luckily understood English and helped him learn. Tommy was one of only a small handful of Americans who had attended the school before the Collapse of the Soviet Union, and did benefit from the experience. However, the collapse of the Union cut his stay short and he transferred to a school in Canada which contained a branch of the Academy. It worked out perfectly, because that way he could keep it a permanent secret from his mother and siblings, who would have gone over the edge of insanity knowing he was where he was.

After twenty years, it had all come back. He heard them talk, and could understand every single word.

"_The man said this would take fourteen days, and now the final day comes with the next sunset."_ The first man said in Russian.

"_I know, I know. Still no word of payment."_ The second one said, again in Russian.

"_It will be interesting to see if this American can fight as good as Al Wasli." _The third one added.

"_I can fight."_ Tommy said, gathering up three words and finding their Russian counterparts, muttering them nervously. He waited for their reaction, but only heard them stop walking. He heard guns shifted into new fire, which stopped him dead in his tracks. His heart pounded gently and he drummed his fingers in the air briefly. _"What did you say?"_ The first man said crossly. Tommy turned around slowly and looked all four men directly in the eyes, and repeated,

"_I can fight."_

The four men paused, glaring at him with an untrustworthy look. They were suspicious.

"_How is it that a person from clear around the other side of the planet knows the language of the Fatherland as if it was his own?" _The first one asked, stepping forward.

"_I studied business in Moscow." _Tommy answered, his memory of the language coming back even further. _"For three and a half years, before the Collapse."_

"_Why should we believe you?" _The fourth one said, a slur of distrust in his voice. _"How do we know you are not a pampered actor with a dictionary?"_

Tommy didn't answer. All he did to prove himself was roll up the sleeve on his right arm, exposing a tattoo of the Seal of the School. All four men were startled by the sight. Although it was in black and white, they recognized the two letters of the Russian alphabet overlapping each other, surrounded by laurel leaves concealed somewhat by Russian Flags.

They knew it was true. Three of them still held onto their guns, but stood in silence for a few moments. Their moods were different now, it was almost as if they were homesick. The fourth one of the group, and the first one he'd understood in the conversation, stared at him.

"_Thomas?"_

Tommy paused at that moment. _"How did you know my name?"_

He looked on as he watched the man reach for the gray cloth wrapped around his head. He was shocked when he saw blond hair revealed in the sun. He then watched as the man reached for his own sleeve and pulled it up to reveal the very same tattoo.

"_Yuri?"_ Tommy gasped.

"_Yes, Thomas." _Yuri said. _"It is me."_

Before he knew it, Yuri, although shorter than he remembered, managed to pick him up off the ground and swing him around, kissing his old friend repeated times. _"It is so good to see you, old friend!"_

"_Wait, this is the old friend you were talking about?"_

"_Yes, this is him!"_ Yuri said proudly, slapping his hand on Tommy's back.

"_Wow_." The second man said, grabbing Tommy's hand and shaking it. "_It's a pleasure to meet a fellow cadet_."

"_Fellow_?" Tommy asked, baffled with shock. "_You all went to the school_?"

The first two nodded, the third only gently nodding. "_I am Ivar Bronir_." The second man said.

"_I am Vladimir Bronir_." The third assed. "_We are brothers from our father's house in Murmansk_."

It hadn't dawned upon him until he took a close look at the two brothers, but they did look somewhat alike. The fourth member of the group stood in silence. _"That is Maku, He is from Siberia, doesn't talk much."_

"_I understand_." Tommy responded. _"I remember you joined the Military, Yuri, but why didn't you go back home?" _Tommy didn't understand why they were still there. The Soviets had occupied Afghanistan during the last years of the Cold War, but they'd withdrawn in 1989.

"_Only the loves of our wives kept us here." _Vladimir answered. "_We've each taken Arab wives._"

"_Yes, four sisters." _Ivar added. _"Daughters of a farmer in the plains. They helped us hide from the enemy forces in Afghanistan, and when they fled here to Iraq, we fled with them."_

"_You see, Thomas," _Yuri began. _"Our hope is to move to the United States. We have loved our wives and they love us, but the war makes it difficult to make lives for ourselves. We also now have children to think about, and this is becoming a dangerous place for them to live. A neighboring family lost all three of their little ones in a shooting near their school. Our wives are scared. They cry at night."_

That hit a nerve with Tommy. He thought of his son, up un heaven, and his daughter, who was so little that if he never returned, she would never remember him. Aside from Justin, Elizabeth had caused him much worry.

Suddenly, Yuri gasped as a horrified face came upon him.

"_It can't be!" _He exclaimed. _"If you're here, than that soldier is-"_

"_Yes." _Tommy sighed. _"He is my brother."_

"_Is he the gay one or the one with the drug problem?"_

"_YURI!" _Ivar barked. _"Show some respect!"_

"_Calm yourself, brother!" _Vladimir said, putting his hands on his brother's shoulders.

"_It is Justin, my youngest brother." _Tommy answered. _"He is the one who had the drug problem."_

"_I must say," _Yuri commented, referring to Justin. _"I've seen many injured and wounded soldiers in my day, but never have I seen one so fearless."_

Tommy stared at his old friend with a funny look. _"What?"_

"_Yes!" _Yuri exclaimed worriedly. _"They've done awful things to him. He's been shot, punched, kicked, even electrocuted!"_

Tommy took a deep breath and remembered where he was, and the situation he was in.

"_We can help." _Maku said. His low voice startled Tommy, for he had no clue where it had come from at first. _"Al Wasli will stop at nothing to reclaim his family's honor. You must be prepared!"_

"_Excellent, Maku!" _Vladimir said. _"We can help you with the fencing!"_

Tommy watched as each of the men disregarded their modern weapons and took out what looked like the only remnants of their lives in Russia. They still had their swords from the Soviet Army, and although they were pretty dinged up and dingy, they could still cut through a loaf of bread without smashing it. _"We must be careful, gentlemen." _Yuri stated, glancing around to see if any of the others were around. _"If our plan is unveiled, we will all perish. Now we must fight!"_

Tommy took one of the swords and faced Maku, who was tall and firm like a redwood with a beard. For the rest of the day he took a refresher in secret from his long lost friend and comrades, who he considered to be his saviors. When they brought him back to the base, they acted as if everything had gone as they had the day before. However, when Tommy was brought back to his cell, everything was not the way he had left it.

Justin was gone.

To Be Continued…..


	23. Never Back Down

Chapter 23 – Never Back Down

The sky to the west began to glow a deep shade of orange as the pitch black of the night began to return over the tall mountains of northern Iraq. The thin air was still and hot. On the lower edge of a rocky mountain plain, a large cluster of human activity stood out, silhouetted against the gray earth. Men in long red robes and black turbans stood guard to the entrance to the mine at Rakula. There were red canvas tents, mining equipment, wooden crates, and vehicles parked in a large cluster. As it became lighter, two men began guarding the narrow, rocky pass at the entrance to the camp. The old railroad tracks could be seen shooting out of the side of the hill and disappear into the rocky surface on the mountain face.

As the two men walked through the secluded pass, they slowly marched back and forth past each other, never taking their eyes off of the path reaching around the bend. Suddenly, there was a sharp hiss in the air and one of the men toppled right over as he stood. The other man turned around and slowly crept to his fallen comrade. As he looked, he gasped silently when he saw the other man was dead, and an instant later another sharp hiss went through the air and the second man fell right on top of the first one. After he hit the ground, the two of them laid there in the dust, two arrows protruding from the mound. A few moments later, a dark shadow walked out from a small cave on the side of the pass. The person reached for each body to make sure they were dead, then pulled the arrows from both of them. Following that, several other people followed her from the cave.

"Good Shot!" Kitty said, putting her hand on Rebecca's back. As the landscape became brighter, they could see more things clearer. Both Jadia and Sabriya took closer looks at the two dead bodies laying in the middle of the path. Sarah was shocked that such young children could take such close looks at dead bodies without getting scared, but she also knew living in a war-torn country like Iraq, they'd probably seen worse.

"These men aren't from anywhere around here." Sabriya said, standing up after kneeling to look. "They smell funny."

"I think they might be Kurds." Jadia said. "They sounded like they spoke differently too."

Robert peered around the corner at the camp. Behind all the machinery and crates, he could see there were more people, and they all looked the same as the two they'd just killed, which told a lot about this group of militants. He'd heard a lot about other groups, and those ones usually found fighters from within the country. This group was savaging for fighters from all over the place. This made Robert think for a moment; this usually happened to militant groups who had been shunned by the rest of the network of groups. They were getting desperate.

"So, now what do we do?" Sarah sighed, looking at the makeshift army. Before she could be answered by any of the others, Nora quickly rose to her feet and stormed into the clearing.

"Mom, wait!" Kitty hissed. Robert tried to grab for her to stop her, but she was too fast.

"HEY!" She screeched loudly, her voice echoing across the hillside, every head in the camp looking up and building into a frenzy of angry shouts as they spotted the woman near the pass. She turned and scrambled back to the pass as about a dozen men gave chase. "Mom, what the hell are you doing?" Kevin cussed under his breath.

"It's now or never, kids!" She barked as she reached next to one of the bodies and grabbed a long wooden club, before turning back to the men. It didn't take too long for them to follow the call, but in one ominous roar, the Walkers stormed onto the hillside towards the men charging at them. They didn't have any guns – instead they had clubs, swords, and whips. Nora broke into a sprint, club in hand towards the first man, who had another club in his hand. Her heart raced as she got closer to him, and in two swift swings, she beat the man into a bloody mess, hitting the club from his hands and striking him right in the face. A second man charged at her with a large sword, but was blocked by Robert, who used his gun to block the sword and a few moments later, the sword was in Robert's hands and the blade was right through the assailant's body.

"_I've always wanted to do this._" Kitty thought to herself, thinking of the Indiana Jones movies she'd watched as a teenager. Snatching a spare whip she found lying on the ground, she snapped it with all her might in a large triangle, striking three men. A split second later, one of them was about to draw a gun from the waist of his robe when he suddenly fell flat on his face, a large knife digging into his back. Kitty glanced back and saw Scotty standing about fifteen feet away, two more daggers from the Kurds in his hands. She saw for a split second as he flung them across the hillside, taking out two more men. Kitty had almost forgotten about the men she was facing at that time when she looked back and saw a man charging at her with an axe. She didn't have any time to move, but moments before he struck her, his feet suddenly left the ground and he plummeted to the ground, his axe landing at Kitty's feet. She looked with disgust at the blood staining the sand, an arrow impaled in the man's throat. Kitty looked back once more and saw Rebecca fire two more arrows into the fighting, killing one more man and missing another.

Sarah had come across an older man in a soft tan robe, his eyes glaring at her with a deep anger which normally would have given her Goosebumps. But it didn't; she was already far angrier. She saw he had a long wooden staff in his hand, as he quickly swing it with both arms in many directions. She quickly dove to the ground, rolling in between his legs and behind him, landing on her back. As he turned to strike her, he prepared to hold the staff high up to swing it down when she put to use one of her best moves from a self-defense class she'd taken. She thrust her foot right in between his legs, and he let out an ear-piercing scream that rang across the hillside. His staff flew out of his hands and straight into the air. He paused for several moments in pain and as Sarah saw the staff beginning it's return to the ground, she snapped her eyes closed as she predicted what would happen next. A sickening crunch confirmed her prediction, as the man fell to the side of her, landing face down in the sand and exposing the ugly and fatal wound the staff had blown into his head.

Within a few moments, twelve men lay dead on the battlefield, and the Walkers picked up their guns and headed towards the opening in the rock. Robert and Kevin carefully peered into the cave, and found it clear. "Come on." Robert hissed as he signaled the others to follow him.

"Mom, I never knew you had it in you." Sarah whispered from behind Nora.

"A mother has to do what a mother has to do." She said sternly as she followed Robert and Kitty. Rebecca had collected her arrows from the men she had shot, and surprisingly enough, wasn't bothered by the sight of the dead. She'd barely paid any attention to them. She just wanted to find Justin.

Scotty hadn't chosen to carry a weapon of his own, but was now armed with four light daggers he'd found at the bandit camp. They had thin blades, but also very sharp ones. He carefully slipped them into his belt as he walked at the end of the line, Kevin behind him.

"You learned that at the kitchen, I'm guessing." Kevin said. He and Julia had hung back to guard the children, and was at first stunned as he saw Scotty take down men from twenty feet away without touching them.

"Yep." Scotty said. "That's what my uncle taught me back home in Mississippi."

The group fell silent as they made their way into the caves, wondering what they would find inside. It was 9:37 PM of what could possibly be the last day of Justin's and Tommy's lives.

To Be Continued…..


	24. True Colors

Chapter 24 – True Colors

Tommy had spent the night barely sleeping at all, and the following day seemed like an eternity. The silence had nearly driven him out of his mind, not to mention worrying about his brother. Before the sunset came, he heard the door opening and quickly scrambled towards the bars. His heart leapt into his throat for a split second when he saw the two dark figures approaching the cell door, but a familiar voice calmed his nerves.

_Are You Ready?"_ Ivar whispered.

"_I am."_ Tommy whispered back in Russian. He immediately recognized the other man as Vladimir, and saw he was carrying a curved sword concealed within an old sheath. He was also carrying a large roll of cloth, which turned out to be a large robe. _"This is their dueling outfit."_

Tommy hesitantly draped it on over his clothes, feeling like a modern Lawrence of Arabia. They showed him where the sheath hooked onto the robe, and he was ready. The twins took their guns and "guarded" him as they took him outside of the building where he'd been kept all those nights. He was led into a cave illuminated by electric lights. At one point, he heard the mechanical humming of a generator and could see how the lights had been wired through the tunnel. Finally, they entered a large room filled with crates and barrels, many of them marked with Arabic writing. As they made their way through the maze of crates, Tommy kept hastily looking around the corner, hoping to see them. He wasn't scared at all. A little nervous, maybe, but he wasn't scared.

They at last came to a large open space in the room. There were six men in the same robes, standing on guard and armed with guns. At the opposite end of the room, between two more armed guards, was Justin. Tommy looked up and saw Al Wasli standing at the center of the room, next to a taller man with a long beard and sword in hand. Ivar left him at the entrance and Tommy paced slowly towards them. As they met, both of the Arabs bowed their heads in honor slightly, Tommy hesitantly doing the same.

"You both shall fight." Rabu said with his arms crossed. "It shall be to the death."

Tommy nodded, his face stern. He glared at Al Wasli angrily, trying his hardest not to show his anger. He saw Justin, sitting on the ground leaning against the wall. He hadn't taken his eyes off of Tommy, ever since he'd entered the room. His face was again drenched with sweat and his breathing was labored. Tommy knew he was probably nervous, because he was just as nervous himself.

"_It'll be fine, I promise."_ Tommy mouthed gently, trying not to be noticed. This didn't seem to have any effect on Justin. Tommy watched as Al Wasli stepped back from the circle and the larger man drew out his sword, exposing a thick, polished blade with a glint that made Tommy's eyes hurt. As he reached for his sword, Tommy noticed something familiar about the handle. It had the same molded handle and ribs of metal encasing it, just like many of the ones he'd used in Russia when he'd practiced fencing with Russian guys wanting to Join the army, like Yuri had. As he drew out the blade, he saw this one was a bit different. The blade was slightly curved and had a thicker blade than the other ones he'd used. Barely a split second had passed when Tommy looked up and saw the other man charging at him with his sword raised high. Tommy jumped back as the man swung it in a fierce curve, jumping to the right as Tommy backed to the left. He held his sword up shakily and barely blocked two strikes, one of them knicking the back of his right hand. He barely glanced at the cut on his hand, the blood dripping onto the ground. He looked and saw the guards had small smiles on their faces, Al Wasli himself was chuckling. They all thought he was crazy, that he didn't know what he was doing.

Just like Tommy wanted them to think.

He quickly turned his side to the man and within a few seconds, the swords clanged at least a dozen times. The smiles faded as now the Arab swordfighter was now backing up as Tommy was now charging on him. He could see the man was getting angry, as now his face began to turn dull red and his eyes widened. As he struck his sword harder, so did Tommy. The swords clanged louder, a spark flying from one of the hits. Tommy ducked under one swing, Jumped over another, and began to pace faster. The nervousness had long since faded. Now he was just angry.

Then it Happened.

The two men crossed swords once more and with a quick turn of his sword, Tommy sent the other sword flying out of the man's hand and less than a split second later, Tommy sent the blade of his sword right through the man's body, the guards gasping silently as they saw the end of the blade sharply protrude from the fighter's back. Tommy looked sharply and sternly into the dying man's eyes, which were filled with shock as he slowly fell to his knees. Tommy withdrew the sword from the corpse as his lifeless body fell to the ground, leaving Tommy standing in the center of the room. His eyes immediately darted from Al Wasli to Justin, when Tommy suddenly grew uneasy. Despite his victory, Justin didn't look any better.

"_GET DOWN!" _Justin mouthed silently and motionless, his eyes wide.

With that, Tommy suddenly heard six sharp clicks. He turned to see all six guards, their guns all aimed at him. He quickly turned to Al Wasli.

"WE HAD A DEAL!" He barked angrily.

"We had a duel." Wasli said, smiling. "But there was no deal."

Gunshots echoed through the caves, followed by a slump to the ground.

To Be Continued…..


	25. A Test of Love, A Test of Will

Chapter 25 – A Test of Love, a Test of Will

Robert slowly made his way down the tunnel, Kitty close behind him. The rest followed, keeping their eyes open. They could hear voices and footsteps echoing within the cavern as they got further and further underground. Kitty had pulled Rebecca up next to her, because if they were seen she was the only one with the best quiet shot. After a few minutes, they came to a large open cavern, completely empty with a hole in the center of the floor. There was light coming up from the hole, but before they could check it out, two guards crossed paths in front of the door. Rebecca took one shot and one of the men fell to his feet. Before she could take another shot, The other guard turned on them, prepared to shoot.

"Hit the Deck!" Scotty barked as he threw a dagger down the hallway, digging into the man's chest and sending him backwards, dead within a few seconds. Robert glanced around the rocky cavern, which had once been completely been carved out of loose rocks. The group slowly crept towards the hole, slowing then they heard a sharp metallic clanging coming from below. One by one, they slowly peered over the edge and saw about 25 feet below them, They saw two men fighting. One was Tommy, and the other was an unknown militant.

"Tommy!" Julia gasped silently. "Oh my God."

Everybody looked at Julia as her tone deepened. "There he is."

They could see Justin from the edge of the hole, up against the wall. "Sweet Lord in Heaven." Nora gasped.

Kitty looked on as her younger brother backed a man twice his size back and forth across the room. "He's doing good." Kitty complimented.

"You can thank Dad for that." Kevin added. They kept watching for a few moments, Julia in particular. She'd never seen her husband like this before. While the others watched, Robert looked at the six guards surrounding the fighters. He saw how they were holding their guns. Something was wrong.

"He did it!" Kevin hissed silently as the group watched the other fighter fall back, dead. A few moments later, a sharp clicking from below confirmed Robert's fears as the whole team watched in horror, seeing Tommy now surrounded.

He heard Tommy bark something, then Al Wasli said back with a laugh. It was a trick.

"_Sweet Mother of God!" _Robert hissed as he suddenly leapt into the air, through the hole.

"Robert-NO!" Kitty and Nora shouted as they watched Robert descend into the gunfire. He tackled Tommy and pushed him to the ground, just before the guards could react before shooting them. They didn't have time to move their guns, and ended up shooting each other instead.

Rabu shouted loudly into the room, followed by a surge of voices coming from the edge of the room, behind the wall of crates. Robert hastily looked for his gun, which had fallen from his hands as he'd jumped. Before he could stand up, he saw a group of men in those same desert clothes charging at them with the same weapons as before; swords and clubs. This time, Robert reached for his gun, which he spotted next to him. He quickly took it in his hands and fired into the corridor, taking out men quickly as they piled up inside the passage. Then he ran out of bullets. He quickly reached for his holster where he kept his bullets, but found it gone. He quickly stood to his feet, urging Tommy to do the same.

"We could use a little help down here!" He shouted after he turned around towards where Justin was. He watched as Al Wasli fled with two guards through a passage cut into the wall, taking Justin with them. He turned back towards the men rushing at him. With his gun, he quickly blocked a man's sword as he'd swung it downwards at Robert, Tommy fencing once more. Kevin leapt to the ground, landing on her feet with her gun in her hands. He fired two shots before they came too close and too many, then he started swinging the gun bluntly into the heads of the attackers. Rebecca and Kitty fell to the floor next, just in time to see Justin being carried away.

"JUSTIN!" Rebecca screamed as she gave chase. Kitty followed her quickly taking two shots and killing two more men before they both entered the passageway. Scotty and Julia both took their leaps of faith to the floor beneath them, landing on their feet as well. There must have been thirty or forty bandits fighting them, and they were falling fast. Julia fired one shot after another, never missing once. She scrambled over to Tommy, her hand on his shoulder reassuring her that he was alive; that she wasn't dreaming. Afterwards, she quickly ducked a man's sword before she shot him square in the chest, then kicking him in the stomach and sending him backwards. Kevin was following the same block, shoot, kick technique, Scotty behind him, wielding two of the daggers and taking stabs at the bandits.

Above them, Sarah hesitated jumping. She'd taken several shots from above, but knew she had to go below.

"Mom, you stay here with Jadia and Sabriya. Keep them away from the edge!" Sarah barked nervously. Before Nora could answer, Sarah jumped and landed on one of the bandits. They kept firing until the last of them were dead, and when it was over, Six of the Walkers were ankle deep in dead bodies. When they were all still, Julia quickly turned and threw her arms around Tommy. He caught her in an instant, Wrapping his arms around her for a brief second before releasing her. "How in the world did you find us?" He asked, looking at them in astonishment.

"One of the bandits at that town told Jadia and Sabriya before he died." Sarah answered. "They found us our way here."

He was overjoyed to see his siblings and in-laws.

"Tommy Walker!" A familiar voice barked from above him. He looked up to see Nora staring down at him.

"Mom!" Tommy yelled.

"You would be in so much trouble right now if we were back home." She said sternly. "But I've never been more proud of you!"

That sentence ended with his focus returning to his brother. "Oh God, Justin!" Tommy sprinted towards the passage in the wall, Kitty and Kevin following him. "Scotty, call for help!" Kevin barked.

"I'm on it!" He called as he and Julia headed back in the entrance. All the bandits were gone, except for four of them hiding in one of the crates nearby. They didn't come out, they just prayed silently in Russian. While Robert and Sarah helped Nora and the girls down from the cavern above, Scotty reached into his pocket and pulled out the radio and the radio battery. He quickly jammed the battery into the radio and turned it on, setting it to the station that Bryan had told him to.

"Mayday, Mayday, anybody there?" Scotty called loudly as he waited for somebody to respond.

"Roger, what is your position?" A voice called back. Julia laughed and breathed a sigh of relief as Scotty responded.

"We are at the mines at Rakula, we've got bandit activity going on and a very badly wounded soldier, we need help!"

"Okay, hold on a sec, what is your RANK?" The voice said in an irritated tone.

"I'm a chef." Scotty snapped back. "Get a hold of General Andrews, he'll explain everything. Just Send Help!"

"Wait while I contact the base." The voice said. "Who is this again?"

"My name is Scotty Wandell, I'm Justin Walker's Brother-in-law!"

There was silence for a few moments, which to Scotty and Julia seemed like hours. Finally, the voice came on again.

"I've got your position through your radio, there are two choppers leaving the base at Mosul right now."

"I've got Signal Flares, and it's getting dark here?"

"Yes, wait until you see the lights and signal for them." The voice called. "Stay on the line until you see them."

Rabu watched in horror as the army he'd worked for months to assemble fell to a bunch of civilians in only a few seconds. He stormed up a long and narrow staircase carved into the rock. The two guards followed behind him, carrying Justin. He'd been thrown down a flight of stairs earlier that day, twisting his left leg painfully and hitting his head hard, a deep purple bruise on his forehead amongst all the cuts and scrapes marked. With each step the guards carrying him took, a sharp stab of pain shot up through both of his legs and his head was throbbing, as his fever had been getting worse. He watched as they reached the top of the stairs and came out on a flat slab of rock jutting out of the side of the mountain. The guards dropped Justin on the ground and stepped back.

"So, you're nice little family thought they could stop me?" Rabu asked Justin, glaring down at him. "Well, they can't save you from me now."

Justin took a deep breath, keeping his eyes on Rabu, who pulled a handgun from his pocket and aimed it directly at Justin's head.

"Now they will experience the same shame and despair I felt," Rabu laughed. "and I will be left to enjoy my honor once more."

Justin said nothing, he just knew this was it. He slowly closed his eyes and waited. He thought of all of them, his mother, his brothers and sisters, his in-laws, and Rebecca. He waited, but it didn't come. Instead, he heard a woman roar in anger and two bodies colliding. He opened his eyes to see Kitty wrestling Rabu to the ground.

"Justin!" He heard a familiar voice cry out as he saw Rebecca running towards him. "It's alright, I'm here!"

She quickly took him in her arms and held him for a moment, watching Kitty thrust her fists into Rabu's face. Rebecca then quickly pulled a pocket knife and cut away at the cords binding his hands and feet together. Justin signed a breath of relief as he slowly moved his arms together, getting out of the position they'd been pinned into for the past two weeks. "Rebecca, you found me." Justin said weakly, and in disbelief. "You came all this way, to Iraq!"

"Yeah, I did." Rebecca answered, shaking nervously. "We all did."

Justin cracked a smile, then looked back to Kitty. "Help her, Quickly!" He said sternly. Before Rebecca even stood up, Rabu hit Kitty hard, sending her flying against the rock wall, unconscious. He stood up and stared at Rebecca angrily, and before she could turn around, he grabbed her by the hair and hit her, throwing her to the ground and away from Justin. At that moment, Justin felt his energy return and he slowly stood up, dizzy at first.

"You've ruined my plan, and now you will pay!" Rabu growled, shaking as he aimed the gun at Rebecca. She screamed briefly and just before he shot her, Justin threw himself onto Rabu, taking him to the ground. A gunshot rang out as Rebecca crawled over to where Kitty was, afraid to get tangled in with the fight as Justin and Rabu wrestled around on the ground. Then, a second gunshot erupted from in between them and they both became still. Rebecca felt her heart freeze for a moment.

"Justin, No!" Rebecca cried as she bolted towards them. Rabu was laying on top of Justin, and they had stopped barely a foot from the cliff edge. Before she reached him, Justin mustered all his strength into his arms as he gently pushed Rabu off of him, and over the edge of the cliff. When Rebecca reached him, she couldn't help but watch that man fall below, landing face down on the rock beneath. After staring for a few moments, Rebecca turned back to Justin, who was laying on his back, breathing heavily and his eyes were closed.

"Justin?" Rebecca asked softly, crouching down towards Justin. As she kneeled by his side, he suddenly wrapped his arms around her.

"I love you," He said softly and hoarsely. "and I'm sorry."

"Justin, don't be sorry." Rebecca responded. "Just hold on and we'll get help, alright?"

Nothing.

"Justin?" Rebecca asked. Still no response. "Justin?" She repeated. She felt his arms slide limply off of him as she pulled away. It wasn't until then that she noticed both shots had not been fired at Rabu. Justin had stopped breathing.

"JUSTIN!"

To Be Continued…..


	26. 73 Seconds

Chapter 26 – Seventy-Three Seconds

Less than twenty minutes had passed since Scotty had bade the call to the military base in Mosul, some 150 miles to the west, when lights could be spotted over the mountains, coming towards them. Scotty had only three flares, so he pulled the stopper from the gun and shot the first one into the sky. As it shot upwards, it burst into a shower of red light, illuminating the mountain range. After he fired the second one, the helicopter began it's descent as Scotty, Julia, Nora, Sarah, and Tommy cleared the area and watched them land. Four men scrambled out of the first one, two with guns in hand, and the other two with a large stretcher. As they approached the group, the Walkers could see the second chopper coming in.

"Where is he?" The first medic asked loudly, trying to be heard over the choppers, which were now kicking up a cloud of dust on the hillside.

"He's in there," Tommy began, heading to lead them into the cave.

"Load the others into the second chopper!" The lead officer shouted to the other as he motioned for Julia to bring Jadia and Sabriya to the other chopper, which had just landed. Sarah followed Julia, along with Scotty and Kevin. Nora began to follow Tommy, but both he and the medics told her to go back to the chopper.

"Mom, Please," Tommy began. "We'll get him."

"But he's my son!"

"Ma'am, we'll get him, don't worry." The medic said with a southern accent as they left her. Tommy led them through the hideout, past all the crates to the open space where all the dead militants were still laying. Robert stood near the stairs, with the four Russian soldiers who had helped Tommy.

"These men aren't with the group." Tommy said quickly to the soldiers following him. They motioned for Robert to lead them to the helicopter. As Robert tried to guide them, using the few English words they knew, Tommy paced up the staircase towards the ledge where Kitty and Rebecca were waiting.

"Did all of you do all of that?" The lead officer asked, referring to the mess in the cave below them.

"Yep."

"Are you even in the military?"

"Nope." Tommy answered. "Just doing my job."

"What job would that be?"

"Big Brother."

When they turned the corner, they saw Kitty gently performing CPR on her brother, Rebecca next to her with her hands clasped over her own mouth.

"Ma'am, I need you to clear out of the way." One of the medics said quickly. Kitty and Rebecca stumbled out of the way shakily as the medics quickly checked Justin's vitals. "We're gonna need to airlift him from here." One of the medics said over his radio as the other prepared the stretcher. Kitty, Rebecca, and Tommy watched in horror as they moved him gently onto the stretcher, exposing an orange-sized spot of blood on the rock and a bullet lodged in the center of it. The bullet had gone right through him.

"Please, people!" The first medic with the accent cried. "We need you to head to the other chopper."

"But-" Rebecca began.

"Now!"

Tommy pulled his sister towards the stairs. Rebecca stood there for less than a moment, tears streaking down her face.

"_Please don't die."_ She whispered to him as she joined Kitty and Tommy on their way down the stairs, their gear in their hands. On the way past all the dead bodies, Rebecca managed to grab three of the arrows, but left the rest. They didn't matter to her at that moment. As they reached the entrance to the cave, they looked up and saw they were already lifting him and one of the medics up into the helicopter. Kitty looked up as she walked for a few moments, then joined the others as they all climbed into the helicopter. They just waited for three of the others. Nora looked out her window and watched as the first helicopter closed up it's doors and took off to the west, and out of sight. She didn't even notice the loud bang of the door closing, which even made the quiet Russian jump.

The helicopter was cramped, the men sat on the metal floor as the women and children buckled themselves into the hard leather seats. Rebecca sat closest to the door and could see the camp and the cave disappear from view into the darkness as the chopper lifted from the ground and turned around, beginning it's ascent over the mountains and towards the city to the west. She couldn't see any dead bodies, and was glad about that. By that time, she didn't care if she never saw a dead person ever again.

Meanwhile, over the radio, the pilot heard from the other medic what kind of a fighter Justin Walker really was.

"_It's pretty bad, Mac." _The pilot heard over the radio. _He's already lost a lot of blood."_

There was silence for a few moments, and then the voice came back, this time in a low tone.

"_Make sure none of them can hear you." _The medic said over the radio in a low tone of voice.

"_Roger."_

"_We're calling it."_

The pilot paused for a moment, breathless. They had been too late.

"_Time of Death, 11:34:09 PM Baghdad Time."_ The pilot didn't respond at first.

"_Don't tell them until we land."_

"_Roger."_ The pilot sighed. He looked out the window at the sea of darkness beneath him. Things had gotten very quiet, so quiet that he could hear the ticking on his watch. The seconds seemed like hours as he thought of this poor family. Now, some of them were asleep, others were gulping down the first drinks of cold water they'd had in days, and some were staring out the windows at the stars above and praying. The pilot briefly made eye contact with Robert in the reflection of the windshield. Robert's face looked very pale, as if he was listening to the radio the whole time. He'd told this kind of news to people before, but it wasn't like this. In that moment, he prayed.

"_Mac, We got him back!" _A voice shouted loudly over the radio, almost splitting the pilot's eardrums. _"Leave it to Jimmy to never quit."_

"_Report the condition." _The pilot ordered.

"_He's still in critical condition, but we should be able to stabilize him long enough for us to get to the base."_

The pilot gave a sigh of relief. He looked at the digital clock, which read 11:35:22. Justin had been dead for just under a minute before they resuscitated him. He looked up at the stars with a grateful look as he turned to yell back to the waiting Walkers.

"It looks like he's gonna make it!" He yelled. Shortly afterwards, the entire chopper cheered with delight and relief. There were tears, embracement, and thanks to the big guy up above, still a Justin Walker.

To Be Continued…..


	27. An American Family

Chapter 27 – An American Family

It was just after midnight when both of the military helicopters arrived at the US Army base in Mosul, which had been their starting point. It was very dark when they landed, and one by one the Walkers stumbled out of the large aircraft, dazed and shocked over the last hours' events. They were shown inside while a team of medics swarmed around the other chopper to bring Justin into the ICU of the base.

The family entered through the doors of the building which housed the infirmary, where they were met by a very astonished General Andrews.

"I must say," He began speaking, his voice low. "Never have I seen civilians take on a group of desert radicals like this and all come out of it alive."

Nobody answered. Some of them cracked smiles, others nodded, but nobody spoke. General Andrews then approached Jadia and Sabriya, who exhaustedly stood aside Robert, who had them each by the hand gently.

"The success of this is owed greatly to the both of you." He said gratefully, patting each of them on their heads. "You will both be rewarded for your heroism-"

"General," Robert interrupted. "Can I speak to you for a moment, regarding that?"

"Of course." General Andrews responded. Robert left the girls with Kitty as the family was shown to a makeshift waiting room down a long corridor and near the main entrance to the Infirmary. Kitty was the first in line, holding both girls by the hand. Nora followed, her arm around Rebecca. Tommy followed, his arm around Julia, then followed by Sarah, Scotty, and Kevin. They were shown to a room lined along the walls with red couches and tables with lamps in between, which was oddly quaint for a military base. They were later told that they treated a lot of civilians at the hospital and many Iraqi families were quite large. A few moments later, a man in a uniform similar to General Andrews came into the waiting room. "Family of Justin Walker?" He announced questioningly.

"Yes, that's us." Nora responded, standing from her spot on the sofa she'd taken next to Rebecca.

"I'm General McCarthy." He introduced, Shaking some hands. "I work under General Andrews, and I just need to clarify a few things."

"Of course, General." Nora said as he took a seat amongst them.

"First of all, let me thank you for taking such a risk to save one of our own." He said with a weak smile. "I haven't seen too many families go to such extremes as this one."

"Well, we think of ourselves as our own army, in a way." Tommy added. Another medic had come into the group and was now examining the cut on Tommy's hand. "You're going to need stitches, Mr. Walker." The medic said. "I need you to come with me."

Before he left, the General asked him one quick question.

"Mr. Walker, How do those four Russians fit into this puzzle?"

"One of them is an old friend." Tommy responded openly, thinking he'd never be able to keep his stay in Russia secret anymore. Many of his family members looked at him in confusion, particularly Julia. "I'll explain later."

Julia watched as Tommy followed the Medic through some swinging doors and out of sight. Exhausted, she slumped back into the armchair she was sitting in, but she couldn't sleep. Nora looked at her for a moment, but then turned back to General McCarthy.

"We'll be sending in a few units to the mine in the morning to check the area." McCarthy said, writing some things down on a notepad he had with him. "How on earth were you able to find them all the way up there?"

"I'd heard the stories." Jadia interrupted, yawning softly as she spoke. "Stories of how the mines were blown into the rock back during the British Occupation."

The General nodded silently and in understanding.

"When we attacked where they were hiding out at first, a man who had found out they had captured a soldier had hidden amongst them. He was wounded in the attack, and I found him just before he died. He told me where they were going."

"I see," The General responded. "and how did you make it all that way in such a short time?"

"A man who lived near our village raised horses, and we bought some from him." Sabriya added, resting her head on Kitty's shoulder. "We followed an old map to the mines and fought them."

General McCarthy rose to his feet and began to turn back to his office. "What about Justin?" Nora asked once more.

"The doctors will tell you when they are finished." He answered. "In the mean time, We'll send someone to bring you some food, and try to get some rest."

* * *

A few moments later, A few of the infirmary staff brought the Walkers some rations and bottled water from the stores. It wasn't the best food in the world, but it was the first real meal they'd eaten in days. Afterwards, both Jadia and Sabriya were curled up on one of the couches, fast asleep. Kitty was in the armchair next to them, slouched over the armrest. Rebecca was asleep, also slouched back in her seat. On Nora's other side, Sarah was wide awake, occasionally glancing back at the hospital doors. Both Sarah and Nora sat in silence, while Julia and Tommy had gone down the hall to talk. He'd decided to tell her the truth about his schooling first.

"So, you spent almost four years in Russia during the Cold War?" Julia asked as a response to Tommy's confession.

"Yeah." He said, rubbing the back of his head gently. He'd needed 14 stitches on the back of his right hand, which was now wrapped tightly with gauze bandages. "My Dad and I both decided it would be safer that way."

"Wow." Julia said. "It must have been tough."

"It was." Tommy responded. "This was tougher, though." He'd noticed her cross was gone, as well as her ring. When Julia noticed his looks, she defended her actions.

"I can get more jewelry, Tommy." She said, breathing heavily a few times to keep herself from crying. "I can't get another you."

Tommy gently took her in his arms as she began crying into his chest. "It's alright, it's alright." He said softly, trying to comfort her. They stood there in the hall for a while, Tommy occasionally glancing back at the hospital doors, praying for somebody to come through there. As he looked back, he noticed both Kevin and Scotty were out like lights, leaning against each other. Then he heard somebody coming down the hallway behind him. He looked to see Robert coming back to join the family.

"How are you doing?" Robert asked.

"Tired." Tommy answered. "You?"

"The same." Robert said as he tiredly walked past Tommy and Julia and squeezed into the armchair with Kitty, taking her in his arms. After a while, Tommy brought Julia over to another couch and they tried to get some rest. Like many times before, they wished it was all a dream.

* * *

"Ma'am?" A man's voice said, awakening Nora from her sleep, as well as Rebecca. When they looked up, they saw a surgeon standing in front of them.

"Oh, God." Nora gasped. "Is he alright?" One by one, the rest of the Walkers woke from their sleep as the surgeon explained the situation.

"He made it through the surgery." The surgeon said. "He put up quite a fight."

There was a short lived sigh of relief around the room. "How is he?" Kitty asked.

"He was in pretty bad shape." The surgeon began explaining Justin's condition. "Although he lost quite a bit of blood and was severely dehydrated, he made it through the surgery. The bullet didn't hit any organs, but did cause a lot of bleeding. His heart failed four times."

With that news, the Walkers looked at him in shock. Even after all of that torment for two whole weeks, he was still fighting.

"We've also began planning surgeries to repair the damage on his knee, but otherwise his injuries are relatively moderate. He needed at least 30 stitches along the side of his face and he's got a pretty bad concussion, three broken ribs, two more were dislocated, his collarbone was fractured, and his arm looks as if it's been dislocated at least three times over the past week or so."

"But he's going to be okay, right?" Rebecca asked nervously.

"He's got a long road ahead of him, but it looks like he's going to make it."

Following that, Nora choked over a sob of joy before taking Rebecca in her arms and hugging her tightly. The rest of the Walkers had assortments of reactions, hugs, kisses, tears, laughs, cheers, all the normal stuff.

"He's going to need a blood transfusion." The surgeon added before leaving. "Are any of you his blood type?"

Nora, Sarah, and Kevin raised their hands, then followed him as he led them through those doors. Rebecca watched Nora leave, then felt her pocket to make sure the ring box was still there. It was. She was even more happier knowing he was alright. She had joined the rest of them and come half-way around the world, and they found him. It was over. After two weeks, it was finally over.

To Be Continued…..


	28. Second Chance

Chapter 28 – Second Chance

The darkness seemed to loom over him as he laid in silence. His thoughts seemed blurred and mixed up for a while, but once his mind cleared, he tried to figure out where he was. His entire body felt numb, as if he'd been placed in a pool of ice water. His mind kept telling him to movehis body, open his eyes, wiggle his toes, clench his fingers together, anything. But his body didn't seem to want to respond. Justin didn't know if he was in a hospital somewhere, in a coma, or if he was even still alive.

His thoughts bounced back and forth between that of his condition and that of his family, his Mom, his siblings and in-laws, and Rebecca. Were they alright? Had they been hurt? There didn't seem for a way for him to find that out unless he could wake up. He kept focusing his mind on his eyes, trying to lift his eyelids open, but it felt as if his eyes had been glued shut. He felt trapped in the darkness, alone, and worried out of his mind. If something happened to any of them, he'd never forgive himself.

* * *

Nora was in a state of fear and anxiety as she slowly walked behind a nurse who was leading her into the intensive care wing of the hospital on the base, where Justin was placed after his first surgery. The doctors told her and the others he would need at least four more before they would release him, and she knew very well that meant he had a long road to recovery ahead of him, rougher than any of the roads he'd traveled before. As she walked along the long hallway, the fluorescent lights shining dimly down on her, she kept pondering in her mind what to say to him, if he was awake. Part of her hoped he was still unconscious, so he wouldn't be in any more pain, but another part of her wanted to hear his voice so desperately. She wanted to see those big brown eyes of his, the same ones which twenty years earlier made her knees buckle every time he asked for a cookie or asked her a question.

"Here we are." The nurse said softly as she pointed Nora towards the second door from the last down at the far end of the corridor. Listening to the buzzing of activity from within the intensive care wing, Nora took a deep breath, closing her eyes for a moment. "Thank You." She said softly, leaving the nurse to go back to her work and continuing slowly towards Justin's room. With each step she felt her throat tighten, as if she was going to pass out right there. But she was quick to shake it off, she had to be, for Justin. She slowly stepped into the soft light shining through the doorway and laid her eyes on him. For several moments she didn't do anything; she didn't talk, she didn't move, she didn't even breathe deeply. She just looked at him, standing still as a statue listening to the beeping of the heart monitor next to his bed. After a few moments had passed, she struggled to take that first small step towards her son's bed. She stepped quietly, hoping not to wake him, and slowly she made her way across the room. When she finally reached his side, she found herself stopping again, just so she could look at him. That moment was the hardest moment she'd ever faced in all the twenty-nine years as his mother.

The Doctors who had operated on him had told her what had happened on the way to the base, things she and the others hadn't heard or seen. Justin had literally been on the edge of death the entire time, and although he was unconscious for most of it, he had obviously been fighting to stay alive right up until they put him under anaesthesia for his first surgery. Nora could now see how the doctors did everything they could to clean and fix the bruised and bloody mess he'd been just hours before and begin to change him back to the same person she'd last seen over two weeks earlier. She was told the extent of his injuries, making her even more aware of what he'd been through. They said he had two severe concussions on the left and back sides of his head, his nose had been broken, and his left eye was blackened and nearly swollen shut. Two overlapping bands of gauze bandages were wrapped tightly around his head, cutting through his hair and covering the two deep gashes in the side of his head. Numerous cuts and bruises could be seen across his face, up and down his throat, and all across his chest. He had four broken ribs, dislocated two more, and had dislocated his right shoulder. One of his more severe injuries had been three different gunshot wounds, all taken to the very same knee he had injured in that same country just one year earlier. The most severe injury he'd sustained had been the militant's last act to avenge his brother's death. While fighting with Rabu on the cliffside, Justin had taken a bullet square in the chest, going right in between two ribs and ripping out through his back, narrowly missing his spinal cord, but severing two arteries in the process. While in the chopper, Justin had been partially conscious when he was read his last rights.

Nora stood at his side silently, her hands clasped together tightly and so raw that it was as if she'd been wringing them for hours. She just stared at his face, trying to look past the bandages, patches and stitches to see if she could find her son underneath all of that. She thought back to the times when he'd first come back from his tours in the Middle East, and how he seemed like an entirely different person. She wondered if this would be anything like those times. Before long, she couldn't help but notice there were some spots of dried blood encrusted on his face, just beneath his good eye. She quickly pulled her hands apart and fished through her coat pocket, desperately looking for some tissues. Finding none, her eyes darted around the room. Once she spotted some in a box sitting on a nearby table, she silently paced over and grabbed a few. Returning to his side, she licked a small wad of the tissue and gently held it to his face. She brushed the blood away gently, wanting to do at least something to help him. After three or four brushes, her heart suddenly leapt into her throat when she saw his eyelids twitch slightly once, then again, and then a third time. She froze in tension as she watched his eyes slowly open up.

"Justin?" Nora asked silently. "Can you hear me?"

"_Mom_." Justin said weakly, barely able to whisper. Breathing slowly and heavily, he blinked a few times to clear his vision. "_Mom._"

"Oh, sweetheart." Nora whispered, gently kissing his forehead and blinking back her tears. "You're safe now."

"_The others_." Justin whispered, gently tilting his head in his mother's direction. "_Tommy, and Rebecca_."

"Everyone's fine." Nora stated. "We're all fine now."

Justin released a subtle sigh of relief, closing his eyes for a moment and resting his head back into his pillow.

"Justin, what's wrong?" Nora asked when she saw his face tense up, his eyes tightly shut.

"_Mom, I can't-" _Justin whispered with a small cough. _"I can't move_."

Nora knew the sedative he'd been given hadn't worn off yet, so she knew his limbs must have felt like they were made of lead. "You'll be fine soon."

Opening his eyes again, now wide enough so that Nora could see his dark brown eyes once again, Justin stared at the ceiling for several moments in silence.

"_I didn't mean for any of this to happen."_ He sighed, wincing slightly as he tried to shift his position in his bed.

"Don't apologize for anything." Nora said softly, but sternly. "None of that matters anymore."

Justin released another deep sigh as he tried to regain control of his breathing, but it was really difficult. At that moment, it felt like someone had rested an anvil on his chest. After completing the deepest breath he could muster the strength for, he slowly looked at his mother.

"_Well, I guess I'm not the only veteran in the family anymore."_

Nora cracked a smile at his remark. "I guess not. It looks like we're a family of veterans now." She smiled when she heard Justin try to snicker in return to her comment, but after a few moments her smile faded, completely disappearing when she saw one single tear roll down the side of his face from his right eye. She could see his eyes were watering and his breathing was becoming labored as she gently sat down on the bed next to him.

"_I never wanted you to see this."_ Justin whispered softly. _"That's why I enlisted, to keep this from my family."_

"Justin, this wasn't your fault." Nora said. "Those men were far out of line to do this to you, and we all came here on our own free will."

"_Mom." _Justin moaned in that dull tone of voice which told her he was sinking into one of his depressive moods again. Ever since he was a teenager he'd done that whenever he got into trouble or had done something wrong. She saw how destructive it was, but knew that the only way it would stop was by his own means.

"_Can I tell you something?" _Justin said, ridding himself of that depressive tone of his. Nora nodded.

"_I really hope you'll understand this."_Justing sighed hesitantly.

"What is it?" Nora asked inquisitively. Justin paused for a moment, trying to find the right words to say to her. While he thought of what to say, she thought of what he would say to her. She had a gut feeling it wasn't going to be pleasant, and her instincts told her he needed her to understand.

"_I wasn't scared_." Justin sighed, looking his mother right in the eyes from where he laid. _"I don't think I ever have been._"

Nora didn't say anything in response to his words, but instead she sat at his side and slowly tried to grasp in her mind what he meant. It didn't take long for her to see a glimpse of what had been going through his mind during what had almost been the last fourteen days of his life.

"You weren't afraid to die?" Nora asked softly, the tone of horror in her voice making Justin uneasy.

"_In some sense, no, I wasn't." _Justin responded. _"The only thing that did scare me was the idea of all of you getting mixed into this."_

"Justin, I don't know how many times I've tried to explain this to you, but this is what families are for. We take care of another."

Taking another deep breath, Justin looked at her again. _"I'm sorry, Mom, but life just isn't that simple."_

"That may be so, but I must point something out to you." Nora said, looking over to the heart monitor next to his bed. "Tell me, what does that tell you?"

Justin looked at the monitor, which told him his pulse, his blood pressure, and the diagnostics of all his vitals. Without saying anything, he looked back at her.

"You're still alive." Nora said with a small smile. "Those doctors told me you fought to stay alive harder than most of the other soldiers they'd seen."

It was a reminder to Justin of what Tommy had said to him just a few nights ago, in the darkness of the desert. A reminder to him of something he felt he'd known all along. He knew he'd fought for his life in the past few hours, but at the same time there were times where he'd just wanted to give up. He thought in his mind of those moments, of the pain and the torture in his mind over the thoughts of the people he loved and cared about in danger. It was to a point whereas he couldn't have given up even if he tried.

"Trust me, sweetheart. I know life is complicated." Nora said. "And to be honest, I wouldn't have it any other way."

Justin chuckled softly at her remark, feeling renewed hope which he'd desperately needed. He watched his mother rise from her seat next to him.

"I'll let you rest now." Nora said. "Your brothers and sisters are all anxious to see you."

"And Rebecca?"

"Of course, and Rebecca."

"Thanks Mom."

Before she walked out of the room, Nora gently took her son's hand and firmly squeezed it.

"I promise, Mom." Justin said softly. "I'll never stop fighting."

"Justin, you never have stopped fighting."

To Be Continued…..

Author's Notes

Sorry it took so long ti finish this up. Rule of thumb about writing stories on shows like _Brothers and Sisters_; Never do it in the middle of the season. I was trying to figure out how to make it fit in with the rest of the rollercoaster of a season they just finished. More coming soon!


	29. Shadows

Chapter 29 – Shadows

Having barely gotten any sleep the night before, Sarah stared at the doors leading down into the ICU, waiting for Nora to come back. They said only one person could see him at a time, and they all agreed to go in order of age, like they usually did. Half her body was numb from sitting on the leather sofa in the waiting room, but she didn't seem to care about her aching joints or her back. She just wanted to see her brother, just as all of her other siblings did. When she'd heard how many times he'd flat lined, she was just horrified. The thought of her little brother dead brought this strange feeling to her, a feeling which made her entire body go numb. She could see it in her mind, everything that would have happened if he hadn't made it. She could see in her mind the family laying him to rest beside their father amongst the large pine trees and the majestic Oakes of Southern California. Entrapped in her thoughts, Sarah pondered over what it would have been like. As hard and painful as it was, she couldn't seem to stop. She imagined herself looking up into the night sky, sitting with her children on their back porch. She imagined herself explaining to Paige and Cooper about how Uncle Justin had gone home to be with Grandpa, and how he was looking down on them. She'd always told them how the night sky was the time when the people in heaven could see their loved ones still on earth the best, and that thought took her back to that night in the desert. With each of these thoughts she just wanted to see him even more, to hug him, to tell him she loved him. As she wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt, she glanced around the room to see her other siblings, some of whom were asleep, while the others waited quietly.

When she looked back to the doors leading down to the ICU, her heart leapt into her throat when she saw her mom coming back down the hall.

"There's Mom!" Kevin hissed eagerly, springing to his feet. Sarah rose from her couch and paced eagerly over to meet her mother.

"How is he?" Sarah asked eagerly.

"Exhausted." Nora said, clearing her throat. "He's in bad shape, but he seems to be in higher spirits."

"That's Justin, alright." Sarah said, trying to crack a smile.

"He wants to see you." Nora told her eldest daughter. "He's really struggling to stay awake, so we'd better hurry."

Sarah nodded before taking a deep breath and facing the door. With one big step, she pushed the swinging doors out of her way and slowly began pacing down the hallway to her brother's room. As she passed the other patient's rooms and the countless other corridors leading to other areas of the unit, she wondered of what she wanted to say to him. She wondered what he might say, or if he'd say anything at all. She wrung her hands nervously a few times before forcing herself to stop. She took several slow deep breaths before finally approaching his doorway. She slowly peered in and saw a doctor standing next to Justin's bed, hunched over him. Sarah slowly walked over to the foot of his bed, watching as the doctor shined a light into each of Justin's eyes. She froze at the end of his bed, her eyes fixed on his knee. They had his leg elevated in a sling, and she could still see the scar from the surgeries he'd had after injuring his leg on his second tour. That scar was now overshadowed by several more, all surrounding three separate patches of bandage which covered up something she knew very well caused him a massive amount of pain. As she rested her hands on the footboard of the bed, she looked and saw the doctor glance over at her.

"Hello." He said with a small grin. "Can I help you?"

"I'm here to see him." Sarah said, looking at Justin. "I'm his sister."

The doctor nodded his head. "Alright then, I think that would do him some good."

She smiled as he picked up his clipboard and slowly walked past her and out of the room. After watching him leave, she looked back and saw Justin looking up at her. His stare almost knocked her right off her feet. She inched her way up alongside the edge of his bed, coming to a stop right at his side.

"Hey Buster." She whispered, reverting to his childhood nickname.

Taking a deep breath, Justin cracked a smile, still never looking away from her. Sarah gently sat down by his side, making sure not to sit on his hand. She took it in her own to move it, but loosened her grip when she saw him wince. When she looked again, she saw his hand was in a black brace. As she was holding it, she could see two dark purple rings around his wrists, so dark they almost looked black. She also noticed how discolored his hands were, his fingertips were the color of prunes. She knew after being cuffed for all those days, his hands must have been killing him.

"_You were right."_

Sarah looked up from her stare at his wrist when she heard his soft voice. "Justin?"

"_What you said before." _Justin whispered, slowly blinking as he continued taking deep breaths. _"About me being in a rut."_

"Justin, that doesn't matter right now." Sarah told him, holding his hand.

"_Yes, it does."_ Justin said. _"I tried to hide from my problems, then I tried to hide them from all of you."_

"Justin, you cannot blame yourself for this."

"_That's what Mom said too."_

"Because she's right." Sarah said, trying to keep herself calm. "Right now is not about pointing fingers, we're here to help you."

Sarah gently took her hand and placed it against the side of his jaw, gently stroking his cheek with her finger.

"You know, when you were born, on that cold, rainy November night, I remember first seeing you, and holding you. I made you a promise that night, and it's the same promise I made to Kitty and Tommy and Kevin."

Justin took another deep breath, blinking slightly as he listened.

"I promised that I would be here for you." Sarah said, trying not to cry. "I want to see you do great things in your life, I want to see you do things that change the world, get married, have kids, whatever you want to do."

Justin briefly cracked a smile for his sister. _"I'm sorry that I haven't quite done that."_

"That's not the whole picture, Justin." Sarah said. "Everybody has their downsides in their lives, and that's why we all need to create the good stuff to balance things out."

"_I know, Sarah."_ Justin sighed, looking up at the ceiling briefly. _"I just wish that all of you hadn't seen it."_

"Seen what?" Sarah asked.

"_You know what I'm talking about, Sarah."_ Justin said sternly. Sarah paused for a moment. She knew what she was going to say, but didn't find it to be her place. She thought of all the counseling he'd gone through, the nights he'd woken up drenched in sweat from the nightmares, and on top of everything, his using. It was hard enough for him that he'd been exposed to it, and now they'd _all _been exposed.

"Justin." Sarah said calmly. "We'll all be fine."

Justin looked at her with a pale expression. Sarah watched as he closed his eyes and rested his head back into his pillow. _"Can I tell you something?"_

"Shoot."

"_There were times," _He said to her, trying to explain. He blinked wildly to keep his eyes from watering up again, but it was getting hard. _"There were times where I just wanted to die, if it would mean keeping all of you from it."_

Sarah felt her entire body go numb for a few moments as she tried to absorb the words that had come out of his mouth. At first she almost got angry with him, that he would say something like that. Then she checked herself. Justin was always the one who spoke his mind about these kinds of things, and it was those words which told her that the greatest terror to him during those days had been not for himself, but for his family.

"_Sarah."_

Sarah looked up. She saw him looking at her with those same big brown eyes.

"_I know we'll be fine." _He said, trying to cheer her up. _"I'll be right here."_

* * *

Sarah sat by his side until he fell asleep, holding his hand and gently stroking the side of his head, trying to get him to relax so he could rest. Once his eyes finally closed, she stared at his face and she was horrified and angry knowing he'd suffered so much. He had been right, there were some things she'd seen which still gave her the chills. Some of the memories from those caves in the desert made her feel so cold that it felt like there was this dark, looming shadow hovering over her head, ready to swallow her whole. All night she'd been casually glancing over her shoulder to see if something like that was really there. It was the strangest thing that brought the thoughts into her mind on what Justin had said to her about being there. The whole time that they had been looking for him, it felt to her that he'd been by her side the whole time.

It gave her some peace of mind, but not much. As she slowly walked out of the room, she was swept up into a maelstrom of emotions, not knowing where to turn. She looked to her side and saw a restroom nearby. Without haste, she quickly stormed into the bathroom, switching on the light and shutting the door behind her. As soon as she heard the lock in the door click, she felt her knees buckle and she collapsed to the ground, bursting into an ominous sobbing which caused her to tremble so violently that she had to cling onto the drain pipe to the nearby sink in order to stabilize herself. She thought of his big heart and his stubborn will, something which she admired in him greatly and at the same time it scared the crap out of her. He was always putting everyone else before himself, even at the edge of death.

To Be Continued…..


	30. From the Other Side

Chapter 30 – From the Other Side

Kitty's deep breaths didn't seem to help her headache very much, neither did the four aspirin she'd taken over the previous six hours. She couldn't believe she was actually right in the center of the war she'd spent so much time defending. By that point in time, she couldn't tell what her position on the war was. She thought back to that warm, sunny September morning eight years ago, and she felt her thoughts reverting to her more patriotic views of the war. However, then when she looked at Jadia and Sabriya and all the people who had been hurt by the war, including her brother, she began re-thinking her position. She'd now learned that the war was far more complicated that she ever imagined.

These thoughts had been flooding her head ever since they'd arrived at the base, and every time they came, they'd eventually lead to Justin. She'd heard of how those kidnappings by these militant groups of the desert usually played out, and the image of them dumping her brother's horribly mutilated body in some shallow grave somewhere out in the desert had almost pushed her over the edge of insanity. She knew very well that he'd been dragged through the gates of hell, and she wondered if he was still the goofy, sweet-hearted kid brother she'd always known him to be. She wondered if this hadn't turned him into just an empty shell – existence in a half-life. Inhaling and exhaling slowly and to a certain rhythm, she paced herself as she walked down the hallway, trying not to peer into the other rooms she was passing along the way. She saw the still figures of other soldiers and marines, hooked up to all sorts of various machines. Every once and a while she'd catch the glimpse of a stump of flesh and bone which had once been an arm or a leg, in visuals she'd never imagined she'd see. The moaning and groaning in pain brought back memories of Justin and his injuries – both physical and mental. She just couldn't imagine how he could survive doing this _three _times.

Her thoughts seemed to come to a standstill when she reached the doorway to his room. The silence inside his small room, interrupted only by the beeping of the heart monitor in the corner, seemed to draw her into the calm atmosphere she found her brother to be sleeping semi-soundly within. As she approached his bed, like Nora and Sarah had done before her, she took into account the true severity of the condition he'd been forced to put up with. At a first glance she could hardly recognize him. His face was so pale and bruised, he almost looked like a ghost.

"_Hey, Kit."_ A weak voice whispered from in Justin's direction. Kitty looked and saw his mouth was gently moving, but his eyes were still firmly closed.

"Justin?" Kitty whispered. "How did you know it was me?"

"_I can smell your hairspray."_

Kitty's eyes narrowed in confusion as she took a handful of her messy hair and smelled it. "But I'm not wearing any."

"_Kitty, turpentine couldn't cover up that smell."_ Justin said, beginning to slowly open his eyes. _"You've had that scent for a long time_."

"Really?" Kitty said with a soft chuckle as she gently took a seat next to him on his bed. "It's really that strong?"

"_I could still smell it when you were living in New York_." Justin said with a weak cough as he blinked tightly to clear his vision. Before long, Kitty's smile faded, which told him the two of them had a lot to discuss.

"Sarah told me what you said." Kitty said, looking at him directly in the eyes. Justin gave a small sigh, thinking of a way to explain it to her.

"_Kitty, let me explain-_"

"You don't have to explain anything to me." Kitty interrupted, putting her hand on his hand. "I think I understand."

Justin paused for a moment. _"Really?"_

"Yeah." Kitty responded. "You've seen a lot of terrible things in your life and you were trying to protect the people you care about from those things."

Justin nodded gently after a moment's pause. He could feel her words coming on, as she had that look on her face telling him she was in confrontation mode.

"I can remember." Kitty began to say, pausing to muster her strength she'd needed to express the words she knew he needed to hear. "I can remember staring at those towers, the flames, the smoke, everything."

Justin slowly closed his eyes as he listened. He didn't want to see her relive that moment, and he knew he probably couldn't stop her.

"I saw those people falling, all that way to the ground." Kitty said, almost choking over her own words. "I kept thinking to myself, _were the conditions in those building so terrible that people were forced to make a decision like that?_"

After a few moments, Justin slowly opened his eyes, and almost wished he hadn't seen her tears. She knew his pain very well, better than anybody else, and he knew she must have felt his pain ore than ever over the past two weeks.

"Justin, was it really so terrible that you were ready to give up?" Kitty asked in a shaky tone. Justin took a few deep breaths, almost choking over a few of them before he finally nodded his head.

"_I tried to at times."_ Justin said nervously, looking back at his sister. _"I didn't think I had any other choice."_

Kitty nodded in silence as she listened to her brother's words, her eyes swelling with tears. She could tell he needed to talk about it, and she was ready to listen. She had to be.

"_It was hard, Kitty."_ He whispered, shifting his vision back to the ceiling. _"I just thought if it was all over, then you wouldn't have to see it."_

Kitty nodded in somewhat understanding, and the look on his face told her these words were anything but easy for him to say.

"Justin, look at me." Kitty said sternly, taking her brother by the hand. "You made it, so we can't have you thinking that way anymore."

"_I know." _Justin responded in a soft tone. _"It's just hard."_

"I know, I know." Kitty stammered, wiping the tears from her eyes before they could fall. Sensing some feeling coming back to his arm, he gently pulled his hand away from hers and placed it on her shoulder, trying to pull her towards him. It wasn't hard to do, as she leaned over and wrapped her arms around him before gently sobbing into his shoulder. Mustering every ounce of strength he could, he raised his arms up together and embraced his sister, something he'd thought he'd never get the chance to do again. Tears began filling his own eyes, and before long they were silently crying together, as if they were kids again.

"_Kitty?"_

"Yeah?"

"_I came close at one point." _Justin sighed quietly as he continued to hold her. _The fear went away, the pain went away, it all went away."_

Justin paused when he felt Kitty slowly pull away from him a little bit, just far enough for her to see his face. She looked at him in a slight state of shock and disbelief.

"_I could see everything, everybody, it was almost like flying." _Justin said silently, looking at his sister dimly. _"Then I heard him."_

"Who?"

"_Dad." _Justin responded. _"He told me to go back, that it wasn't time yet."_

Kitty didn't respond to his statement, but instead sat there and tried desperately to absorb his words. She wondered if he'd been hallucinating, or dreaming, or if he'd really died.

"_He said she was waiting for me, and he said he was proud of me." _Justin said with a weak smile. _"Then I woke up."_

Kitty was now leaning towards the possibility that he'd been dreaming. But she didn't tell him, she just smiled and gently rubbed the side of his face with her hand.

"It's okay now." Kitty said, trying to get him to relax. "You'll come home now, we all will."

Justin nodded with a stronger smile and took his sister's hand, clenching it as hard as he could. _"I'll be here, Kitty."_

Kitty smiled at his remark. "You always have been." She gently kissed his forehead before turning to leave the room and let him get some rest.

"_Hey, Kit."_

"Yeah, Justin?"

"_He talked about you."_

"Really?" Kitty asked with a forced smile. "What'd he say?"

"_Way to go, Peanut."_

Kitty nodded slowly before turning back towards the hall, and leaving the room. Once she was out of his sight, she felt an immense amount of relief sweep across her. He was still Justin, the same Justin he'd always been. At the same time, she felt a strange presence around her when she thought of how he could have known about the nickname her father had called her when she was little and had stopped calling her that before he was born. As she slowly walked back towards the lobby, arms crossed and eyes drying out, she paused for a moment when she passed a door that looked different from the others. There was a wider gap of all between this door and the two on either side of it compared to the other doors in the hallway. She'd left the ICU and was just around the corner from the waiting room. She looked over her shoulder before slowly opening the door and stepping into the chapel.

The scent of burning candles helped relax her from her tensed up state she'd been for the past several hours, and they helped her headache by some degree. She looked around the room, seeing light tan colored walls with wood columns separating it into large squares. On each column was a small shelf jutting out, holding a small candle within a red glass cylinder. She looked across the wooden pews to see the same candles lighting up the other end, and at the front of the room was a large stained glass window, shaped like a large cross. She slowly sat down at the far end of one of the pews and clasped her hands together, gently closing her eyes.

_God,_

_Thank you for being there to lead him home, and for letting him stay. Thank you for giving us the strength and the guidance we needed to find him. _

_And if you see my Dad, tell him I said Thank You._

_Amen._

As Kitty opened her eyes, she breathed a long-awaited sigh of relief, and at that moment she was more confident than ever that he'd make it, and she also knew there was somebody out in the lobby who played a major role in keeping him alive during those dark hours, someone she hoped one day could once again truly call herself a Walker.

To Be Continued…..


	31. Remember Me

Chapter 31 – Remember Me

"He held on for Rebecca." Tommy gently whispered as he sat next to Kitty in the chapel after joining her. "Otherwise he probably would have died a long time ago." Kitty stared at Tommy for a moment, then turned her attention back to the cross in front of the chapel.

"Tell me." She whispered. "Tell me about what happened out there."

Tommy cleared his throat, trying to dig up those memories of the days in the hot desert. His skin was still badly sunburned from being forced to walk through the rocky hills during the days they'd held him prisoner along with Justin. He thought of his former schoolmate and the other Russian men who were now being questioned about their role in this whole situation. There was so much he wanted to tell her, but he wondered if she could take it.

"Alright." He said. "When they first brought me to him, he was lying on the floor, in the darkness, in this tiny little cell in the compound. By that point he was already so badly hurt, and he was so sick. I kept thinking that he could have died at any moment."

Kitty kept listening to her brother's words, trying to understand better what he'd gone through. Understanding of the trauma was the first step to helping him recover, helping them all recover.

"By that point in time, he was almost gone." Tommy sighed. "He was ready for it to be over."

Kitty watched as her brother lowered his head for a moment and looked to the ground, running his fingers through his hair.

"After we talked for a few minutes, I could see he was still trying to put up a fight." Tommy said, head still down. "He didn't want to go."

Kitty was pretty confused by that point. "So, he was ready to give up, but wasn't ready?"

"No, it's not like that." Tommy said, raising his head slowly. "I don't think he thought he had a choice."

After hearing that statement, Kitty found herself slipping into another hush of silence. It seemed as though Justin's problems were centered around a matter of faith. It seemed to him that there had been times where Justin had just the right amount of it, too much of it, and not enough of it.

* * *

Growing up in the Irish Catholic faith, Tommy had always carried a strong sense of faith with him, and as he walked slowly down the hallway to see his brother, he kept thinking of what to say to him. He knew Justin could overcome this, he just knew he could. The thoughts of lying next to him in the cold darkness crept up on him like a lingering shadow. He remembered trying to keep Justin warm in the night, and thinking of how a place so close to the equator could be so cold. What truly haunted him was remembering how he was afraid to go to sleep at some points. He didn't want Justin to be alone if it happened. Now, he knew there were a lot of words Justin needed to hear.

As he approached the doorway to Justin's room, he stopped for a minute to clear the tears from his eyes and the negative thoughts from his mind.

"_He's going to be fine, He's going to be fine."_ Tommy whispered to himself as he counted in his mind the final steps into the doorway of his brother's room. He closed his eyes for a brief second before coming in sight of Justin, expecting the worst. But when he opened his eyes, he found his brother staring at him from across the room patiently.

"_I was wondering when you'd show up."_ Justin said silently as Tommy slowly crossed the tiny room. _"The big sword fighter."_

Tommy smirked silently at his brother's comment before taking a seat on the bed next to Justin. "You're gonna be okay now, Justin."

Justin didn't respond to Tommy's words at first, but only sighed. "_I'm sorry all of you got mixed into this_."

Tommy rolled his eyes. "For the millionth time, it wasn't your fault." Tommy said sternly. "Why is it so hard for you accept that?"

"_Because I was there."_ Justin said.

"True, you were there." Tommy said. "You did kill that guy's brother."

Justin stared silently at his brother with a rather pale expression, showing Tommy the guilt he'd carried on his shoulders all those days.

"At the same time," Tommy added. "You saved a little girl's life, and I've never been prouder of you."

Justin cracked a weak smile back at Tommy. _"How are those two doing?"_

"They're going to be fine." Tommy sighed, glancing over at the door. "I've got to admit, they've got to be the most courageous twelve-year-olds I've ever known."

Justin rested his head back into his pillow, recollecting over all the events that had led up to this point in time. Tommy gathered his thoughts on what to say in the meanwhile.

"Kitty told me what you said to her." Tommy said. Again, Justin reverted into his silence. He was trying to get them to understand what he'd gone through, and his reasons for his actions, but it was hard to do when he didn't even understand them fully.

"You love her, don't you." Tommy stated, referring to Rebecca.

"_More than anything."_

"I thought so." Tommy said, thinking of how much Justin had changed since knowing Rebecca. "Tell me."

Justin sighed with a dull smile as he stared into the ceiling. _"It's just that, when I'm with her, anything seems possible."_

Tommy nodded at his brother's statement. "She does seem to have a positive influence on you."

"_She does."_ Justin sighed. _"But it's mostly because she understands me."_

Tommy's eyes narrowed curiously at that statement. "In what way does she understand you?"

"_When it comes to life experiences."_ Justin said, glancing out the corner of his eye at the doorway. _"She's had her hard times too."_

"Haven't we all?"

"_No, I mean REALLY hard times."_

"Well, considering who her mother is, I find that easy to believe."

Justin chuckled at Tommy's comment, wincing slightly before coughing a few times. Tommy quickly reached for a glass of water on the table nearby and gave it to Justin. After slowly gulping down the ice water, Justin gave Tommy the glass back and reverted back to their conversation.

"_Times like I've been through."_

"I see." Tommy said, nodding his head. "So, what's this about the ring?"

"_I've been saving up for it for a while now."_

"So, are we going to have another sister?"

Justin didn't respond right away, but a small smile told Tommy the answer he wanted to hear.

"I thought so."

"_Well, I don't want to push things, considering the circumstances."_

"Justin, you're going to be fine." Tommy said. "There's not much to worry about."

Justin closed his eyes for a few moments. _"I love her, Tommy. She saved me."_

"Hey, we all saved you."

"_I mean before this_." Justin stammered. Again, this was something Tommy seemed to be aware of.

"I know, bro." Tommy said. "But that's why you've got to stop being so cynical towards yourself."

Justin only looked on as Tommy gave him an ultimatum.

"I know you've screwed up in the past, and I'm sure there will be more screw-ups in the future." Tommy said. "But that doesn't make you as a person a screw-up."

Justin said nothing, just thinking back to some of the things he'd done in the past. People had been telling him he wasn't just a screwed-up drug addict, but there were times where it was hard to believe.

"You've been to rock bottom, there's no doubt about that. I know I'll never fully understand what you've been through, but I do know for a fact that you're strong enough to overcome all of that."

Justin scoffed at that comment. _"Did Mom put you up to this?"_

"No, I'm here on my own free will." Tommy said. He paused for a moment, thinking back to how this whole ordeal had taken shape. "Justin, do you know why Dad was always so hard on you?"

"_Because that's what he did."_ Justin said.

"No," Tommy stated. "He did that because he knew you could do better, just like all the rest of us did. And in case you haven't noticed, you have done better."

Justin raised an eyebrow at his brother.

"You've been clean and sober for a long time now, and you've been working." Tommy said. "That's a good start."

"_I guess." _Justin sighed. _"I just still get the feeling that I'm stuck one step behind everybody else."_

"Justin, trust me, everybody feels that way." Tommy said. "These doubts and this guilt are things you need to stop doing. Forget about the past, cause it's about time you focused on the future."

Justin sighed, then paused for a moment, just staring at his brother. Tommy always saw him for who he really was, and never made it sound biased like his Mom did. _"I know you're right."_

"Then what's stopping you?" Tommy asked. After a moment of silence, Tommy looked Justin square in the eye.

"Justin, I think you were fighting to hold on long before I got to you, and you were fighting to hold on long before any of this started. I know that's because of Rebecca, isn't it?"

After a moment, Justin gently nodded his head.

"You owe your life to her, Justin." Tommy sighed, rising from his seat on the bed. "I think now might be the right time of thinking of a way to repay her."

As he watched Tommy leave, Justin stared at the doorway for a few moments before gently resting his head back into his pillow. As hard as it was to accept, Justin knew Tommy was right. He had to change, or he'd lose her for sure.

To Be Continued…..


	32. What Matters Most

Chapter 32 – What Matters Most

Kevin had been sitting at his brother's side for just shy of an hour, listening to him sleep. It was funny that one thing he immediately recognized in his little brother more than anything else was his snoring. To Kevin, it sounded like an old lawnmower with a bunch of tennis balls caught in the blades. Kevin was glad to hear it, because to him, it was a sign that things were getting back to normal. It meant that Justin was on the road to recovery. Kevin sat in complete silence, listening to the heart monitor across the room from him beeping. The sight of Justin's injuries was gut-wrenching to Kevin, but he felt he had to take note of his brother's suffering. The doctor who had performed the main section of Justin's massive surgery to mend his injuries told him of how much pain Justin must have been in during those weeks. Every injury he was aware of was another reminder to him of how capable Justin was at facing the problems in life. While still thinking of his brother as a stubborn idiot, he also saw somewhat of a warrior in Justin. It seemed odd, but Kevin had always seen it in him.

By that point in time, Kevin had waited anxiously for the chance to share some words with Justin. The thought of never seeing him again really had made Kevin think of the importance of brotherhood. He thought of the fun times they'd had together as kids. Playing basketball together and hiding fake spiders in Kitty's dresser drawers brought a smile to his face.

"Please wake up, Justin." Kevin whispered silently, so silently that he could barely hear it himself. As he retreated into his thoughts, his memories faded back to one of the funniest memories he had with his brother.

"Camp Lackawanna." Kevin sighed with a small grin. "Summer, 1991."

While he spoke, his eyes occasionally glanced at his brother's pale face, hoping Justin could hear him.

"It was our first night there, and everybody was around the campfire. The counselor couldn't find the the marshmallows until right before they had to put out the fire, and you came up with the idea to put all of the marshmallows onto that one stick with all the little twigs on it. Everybody thought it was so cool how you figured that out, except for that one kid who bit into his marshmallow and the twig was still stuck inside it."

Kevin snickered at the memory of Justin at the age of twelve, proudly holding up that large branch with twenty-something smoldering marshmallows stuck to it, what a feast that was.

"_Adam Crawford."_

"Huh?" Kevin whispered, looking over and seeing his brother's eyes slowly opening.

"_That was that kid's name," _Justin whispered with a small cough. _"The one who got the sliver in his gums."_

Kevin paused for a moment, thinking back to that night. "Right, he was that kid from Juba City."

Justin chuckled at the old memory as he struggled to regain consciousness. _"We used to have fun together, back in the old days."_

"Well, we still do, buddy." Kevin sighed, resting his hand on Justin's, while being careful of the IV line running through the needle into Justin's wrist. After a deep sigh, Kevin lost track of whatever he'd wanted to say to his brother. "I'm really sorry this happened to you." Kevin whispered softly.

"_Don't be."_ Justin whispered. _"There's nothing for you to be sorry about."_

Although Kevin still didn't believe it had happened, he was still coming to terms that he'd set foot in one of the most hostile regions in the world. He knew very well how lucky they had been to have made it all that way to find Justin. He knew that if one little step they had taken had been out of place, they all could have been killed. Kevin drifted off into a gaze into the white and black speckled tiles on the floor, thinking how close they'd come to the war.

"_Hey, Kev."_

Kevin looked up.

"_You did good."_ Justin sighed, his eyes wide open and fixed on his brother. _"You did good."_

* * *

Down the hallway, out of the chaos and despair felt within the ICU, Sarah stood at the foot of a hallway leading out of the waiting area and down into a small cluster of rooms filled with bunk beds. One of the nurses told them that family members came to the infirmary all the time to see their injured loved ones and friends, and for many of them it was hard to leave on those long nights. Sarah looked down the hallway into the room her family had since piled into. That day had flown by very fast, as now the sun was setting outside, and it was getting dark and cold. As she leaned against the corridor wall, Sarah still couldn't get over the fact she'd seen the war, she'd seen the region she'd heard so much about, so many terrible things. What surprised her the most was that it wasn't what she expected, what surprised her was that she'd seen so many people that were still going on with their lives, despite the war. It was a changing experience for her.

Taking a deep breath, she turned around and returned to the room where her family was resting. It was a small room with only four beds, but that didn't seem to bother anybody. When she entered the room, she saw Kitty standing next to the set of bunk beds on the left side of the room, facing two still figures concealed beneath the tan sheets of the top bunk bed. Jadia and Sabriya were both fast asleep, breathing heavily and silently. Kitty stood in silence, her arms crossed.

"Kitty?"

"Shhh!" Kitty hissed silently. "They're sleeping."

"Yeah, I can see that." Sarah whispered, circling her sister. After standing in the silence for a moment and looking at her sister, Sarah was seeing more signs of how fond Kitty had grown of those two girls.

"They were so brave to do what they have done for us, for Justin." Kitty sighed. "There aren't too many twelve-year-olds out there like them."

"I know, Kit." Sarah sighed in response. After glancing around for a moment, She saw many of the others were also fast asleep. In the other set of bunk beds, a low murmuring chorus of snores could be heard. On the top bunk, Scotty was laying face-down in the sheets, his hand hanging over the edge of the bed. Beneath him, Tommy was flat on his back, snoring with his mouth open. Julia was curled up next to him, his arm around her. Sarah noticed her other brother-in-law was missing.

"Where's Robert?" Sarah asked.

"He's speaking with General Andrews." Kitty said. "They took a risk supporting us on this whole thing, and now they've got violations coming out the wazoo."

"I'll bet." Sarah responded. "But it's not like the risk they took was in vain."

Kitty nodded, thinking of her youngest brother lying in the ICU. She'd been there when the General and several other officials had been informed that they had found Justin, and that they'd uncovered the base of the militant group in the mountains. Robert had told her before that the desert was full of small groups like the men who had tried to kill Justin, and after one small glance at Justin, most of the officials found it easier to overlook the violations and be grateful that one of their own had been spared the fate that many others had met.

"Do you think there will be any trouble?" Sarah asked.

"Probably." Kitty sighed. "Although we were successful, that doesn't condone the fact that we broke a lot of rules to do this."

"What do you think will happen to these two now?" Sarah asked again.

Kitty breathed a low sigh. "I don't know." Kitty whispered. "I don't know."

* * *

8:22 PM

That was the time Rebecca was slowly walking down the hallway of the ICU, the bright lights above her hurting her eyes. Still brushing the dust and dirt from the desert out of her clothes, she could hardly lift her head up to see any of the other patients in the unit. Kitty had told her of some of the other patients she'd seen, and Rebecca was already on the edge of her last nerves well enough as it was. She counted the doorways along the right side of the wide corridor, waiting for the eleventh door. She'd passed the sixth, seventh, eighth, almost there. At the ninth, she expected to see Kevin or hear his voice or something, but just as she was about to approach the tenth door, a sudden shrill beeping echoed out of the room two doors down, almost causing her to jump right out of her skin.

"_CODE BLUE – REPEAT – CODE BLUE"_ A voice softly echoed over the ICU's overhead speakers.

"_Justin!" _A man's voice cried from inside the room. _"My God, Justin!"_

Rebecca's eyesight shot forward in the direction of Justin's room just in time to see two nurses rush through the doorway and into the room. Rebecca quickly picked up her pace, going from a slow walk to almost a brisk jog as she sprinted quickly down the remaining sixteen feet of corridor. When she reached the door, her view was obstructed by one of the nurses pulling a panicked Kevin out of the way as two other doctors rushed in.

"What's happening to him?" Kevin asked quickly and loudly. "What's wrong?"

"Mr., Walker, we're going to help your brother as best we can, but in order for us to do that, you need to stay clear of the way." The nurse responded in a much faster pace before turning back to the gaggle of doctors and nurses surrounding Justin's still figure. The nurse had almost pushed Kevin right into Rebecca, and he stopped when he felt her behind him. He turned to see her standing almost directly behind him.

"Kevin, what's going on?" She asked worriedly, her voice high and her throat tightening.

"I-I don't know." Kevin stammered, as he was shaking from the shock of what he'd just witnessed. He put his hands on her shoulders as he tried to regain his balance before looking back into the room. When Rebecca looked over his shoulder, her heart leapt into her throat when she saw the heart monitor displaying a straight, flat line where there should have been. With the sharp ringing sound of the flat-line ringing through the air, both Rebecca and Kevin seemed to freeze for several moments. One nurse had a bag valve mask over his mouth and nose and was trying to help him breathe, while another gently performed CPR on him. Their talking was very loud and stern and when they placed a few white pads on his chest, Rebecca knew she couldn't watch. She tried to pull her attention away from him as she heard the defibrillator charging up, but she couldn't. When she saw his body jolt after the first shock, she could almost feel it pulsing through her own body. After the second time, she was digging her fingernails into Kevin's shoulder. Seeing she was about to have a nervous breakdown, Kevin quickly wrapped his arms around her and tried to shield her from the sight. Part of him wanted to get away from that spot, but for some strange reason, he couldn't move a single muscle in his body. Four times they shocked him, and he didn't respond.

_Please, no."_ Rebecca said silently to herself in her thoughts.

Before she could finish her thought, the nurse's words could be heard by the two of them.

"He's Back." One of the women said with a sigh of relief. After a brief moment, Kevin and Rebecca released each other and glanced back at Justin. The flat-line ringing had ceased, replaced by the beeping they'd heard before.

Sadly, the relief was bittersweet, as the next words that came out of the doctor's mouth told Kevin and Rebecca that Justin wasn't out of the woods yet.

"Call the Cardiology Department." He said loudly. "He's Hemorrhaging."

Slowly, Kevin stepped towards the doctor by only a few feet, just to hear what the doctor was saying.

"His blood pressure's dropping." The doctor announced. He looked at one of the nurses, who quickly rushed to the telephone on the wall nearby and called the base's blood bank.

"We need twelve units of Type-O, and have more on hand." She said sternly, glancing over at Kevin and Rebecca. After hanging up, she turned and walked over to them.

"I'm terribly sorry, but we need you to wait in the waiting room." She said, leading them out of the room and back down the corridor. "I promise, the doctors will let you know what's going on with him as soon as possible."

As the two of them staggered back to the waiting room, they were both petrified over what had just happened.

"Hemorrhaging?" Rebecca asked, trying to think of the definition of the term.

"He's bleeding inside." Kevin said, thinking back to his days as a fan of _ER_. "He's bleedng inside _badly_."

Before Kevin could finish his sentence, he noticed somebody walking towards him out the corner of his eye. He slowly glanced up, hoping it wasn't who he thought it was. His heart sank when he saw who it was.

"What happened?" Nora asked in a shaky voice. Both taking deep sighs, Kevin and Rebecca both pondered over who should tell her that her son almost died, _again._

To Be Continued….


	33. He is Holding His Own

Chapter 33 – He is Holding His Own

Nora's heart was pounding and her eyes were sore and red from crying once she'd finally calmed down. She felt like somebody had broken a two-by-four clean in two over her head, and was still numb from the shock. Barely fifteen minutes had passed since Justin had coded and flat-lined, and the doctors were examining him, trying to figure out what was causing the bleeding. It just seemed like a nightmare that nobody could wake up from. All around the waiting room, the Walkers were waiting anxiously for news of Justin's condition. They knew he must have been at the end of his rope at that point, and might not even survive much more trauma. It looked as if his battle wasn't quite over after all.

"I was just speaking to him." Kitty mumbled groggily, her head tilted down and her face buried in her hands. "He sounded like he was getting better."

Watching her sister shudder with a few silent sobs, Sarah put her arm around Kitty, gradually pulling her into one of those sister-sister hugs.

"Don't worry, Kit." Sarah said softly, patting Kitty's back gently. "He'll be fine, he's in good hands now."

"Yeah." Tommy sighed from the couch across from his sisters. "He has to be alright." He said in a softer voice. As he himself gently lowered his head to make a silent prayer for his little brother, Julia wrapped her arm around his and clasped his hand, and they prayed together. She'd already chewed through three fingernails, as the hospital waiting room dredged up terrible memories for her, as it did for all of them. Silently, they all watched eagerly as doctors and nurses rushed by, busy with their own schedules. It seemed like they were ignoring the family, not paying any attention to their fears and worries.

"They're probably used to it." Scotty mumbled, glancing at Nora. "They've probably seen it enough."

Nora nodded silently, trying to shaker off her anger at their ignorance. She reminded herself that going crazy over her own fears wouldn't help Justin. As she brushed her fingers through her hair, she saw out of the corner of her eye the doctor who they'd spoken with before. He was walking out of the ICU towards them, and the look on his face told her he wasn't stopping by to say hello. She quickly rose from her seat on the couch when he entered the room.

"Mrs. Walker?" He asked solemnly.

"Yes?" Nora asked eagerly. She and the others watched as he silently circled the room to reach the opening in the circle of couches. He looked at every one of them, which told each of them that it wasn't good news. He reached the opening and took a seat, facing all of them.

"I'm afraid Justin's prognosis isn't good." He sighed. "Justin's had an Aortic Rupture."

The entire family fell into a complete hush of silence. Nora's face faded to a dull gray, almost as if she'd aged twenty years right there in those few seconds.

"A _what_?" Kitty gasped. Taking a deep breath, the doctor tried to explain to them what had happened.

"The Aorta is the blood vessel which delivers blood from the heart muscle to the multitude of veins which then deliver it to the rest of the body. We've discovered that due to a foreign object, the aorta in Justin's heart is tearing, and he's bleeding both around and inside his heart."

Nora blinked in horror a few times, unable to speak. Sarah tightened her grip on Kitty's shoulders, as she bit her lip.

"Can you help him?" Sarah asked in a shaky tone.

"We can." The doctor sighed. "But, this is a rather difficult situation."

"How is it difficult?" Kevin asked with a sharp pitch in his voice, signaling he was on his last nerve. "I've heard operations like that are risky but run-of-the mill with modern medicine."

"You're right, Mr. Walker." The doctor responded. "The procedure is to patch the tear with either artificial or transplanted tissue, so that the damaged tissue can heal."

"Then what's the problem?" Kitty asked.

"Because his body has gone through so much strain and he's in a severely weakened state," The doctor tried to explain, but he was struggling to find the words. They could tell there was something he didn't want to tell them.

"Tell us." Rebecca said, her voice low and hoarse. She lifted her head up to look at the doctor, square in the eyes. "Please tell us."

Clearing his throat, the doctor struggled to find the right words to use.

"Under normal circumstances, we'd have him stabilized until he was stronger, then commence the surgery, but considering how much blood he's already lost, that isn't possible anymore."

"You mean you can't stop the bleeding?" Nora asked, finally finding her voice.

"We've stopped most of it, but we're running out of time." The doctor said. "We can't wait anymore, we need to operate now."

"Then do it." Nora sighed. "Just do it."

"It's not that simple, Mrs. Walker." The doctor sighed. "Justin is still in critical condition, and he's getting worse."

The entire family paused for a moment, sensing the worse. Kevin had seen what had happened, and knew it wasn't good. Tommy thought to when William and Elizabeth had been born early, and they were spoken to in that same tone of voice, making goosebumps rise along his arms. Kitty thought of their father, how he would have interpreted this news. She wondered what he'd say, how he'd take it. Sarah thought of her daughter, when they'd first found out she had diabetes. That burning fear in her heart, and in the pit of her stomach, had returned. Nora looked at Rebecca, then back to the doctor.

"What will happen to him."

With another sigh, the doctor prepared himself for the worst. "Our plan is to put him into a medically-induced coma, to prevent any further damage to the rest of his body."

"Will that improve his chances?" Nora asked.

"Yes, but not by much." The doctor sighed.

After a brief pause, Kitty raised her hand, with one finger pointed up to keep anyone from interrupting her. "What are his overall chances?" She asked softly.

"At the moment, between ten and fifteen percent."

Nora drew in a cold breath, almost freezing in time. To her, it seemed like the world was slowing down as it spun on its axis. Everything seemed to slow down, in a time where she wished the most it would speed up. Everybody around her seemed to disappear, and her focus was solely on Justin. Every second seemed to haunt her as she thought of the massive amount of pain he'd been through, more than anybody should ever have gone through. Why was this happening to him, what had he done to deserve this?

Snapping out of her daze, Nora looked to see Julia burying her face in Tommy's shoulder, as he gently took her in his arms. She saw both Sarah and Kitty seem to lose all the color from their faces, as if they'd gone numb. Kevin slumped heavily back into his seat, numb from shock, with Scotty not far behind him.

"I'm sorry, but if we don't do this surgery now, he'll be dead within the hour." The doctor said, turning his clipboard around and pointing to the two lines Nora needed to sign in order to approve of the operation. Nora reached up her hand, but felt herself pause for a moment, the force of what was happening seeming to stop her dead in her tracks. Clenching her hand in her fist, she reached for the pen hanging from the string on the clipboard. She could feel her hand tighten up as she struggled to write her signature onto the paper.

"In addition to this, there's a protocol that we try to follow in these kinds of situations." The doctor said in a low tone as he gently took the clipboard, turned the page, and passed it back to Nora. Glancing over it a few times, she casually shook her head in confusion. "What's this?"

"We give the family the option of signing a DNR, or _Do Not Resuscitate_ form." The doctor said. "Considering everything your son has been through, this is meant to limit his suffering."

Nora blinked a few times just from the shock, feeling as if she'd been splashed with a bucket of ice-cold water. She understood they were just trying to help, but she couldn't help but be angry at his request. They were just going to give up and let him die? She looked at each of her four remaining children, each of them pale and stunned with what they were faced with. Finally she looked over at Rebecca, only finding her to be looking down at the floor with her arms crossed, almost as if she was withdrawing into her own shell. This had been a lot to deal with for her, as it had been for all of them. But Nora knew that Rebecca's experience with all of this contained something more than the experiences of everybody else. She loved him, that was something Nora knew very well.

"Um," Nora said to the doctor in a shaky tone. "Could we have four or five minutes to discuss this?"

"Of course." The doctor responded, rising from his seat. "But I must remind you that we don't have a lot of time."

As he walked away, Nora looked around at her other children and their spouses once more, each of them numb with shock. She looked as Sarah shook her head a few times. "This can't be happening." She said in the same shaky tone. "We came all this way for it to end like this?"

"Now, hold on." Tommy interrupted. "I'm not sure how this works, but doesn't he get a say in this?"

"Are you _crazy_?" Kevin snapped in a low tone. "Would you want somebody to ask you that if you were in his position?"

"I'd at least want to know what I'm facing." Tommy replied.

"Well, this isn't about you." Kitty added. "This is about him."

"So, what do we do?" Sarah asked after taking a deep breath.

Holding the clipboard in her hands, Nora stared at the form which could very well mean the difference between life and death for her son. Every maternal instinct she had was screaming for her not to sign it, but as strange as it seemed, she felt there was somebody else better suited to make that decision. She gently set the pen down atop the clipboard and placed the clipboard in Rebecca's lap. Rebecca snapped out of her gaze into the floor tiles and looked at Nora with a stunned expression. She glanced around at the other Walkers, who were just as equally stunned at Nora's decision.

"But, Nora," Rebecca said in a soft tone, shaking her head. "I—I,"

"Rebecca." Nora stated, putting her hands on Rebecca's shoulder. "If it wasn't for you, we wouldn't have made it this far."

Still in a massive state of shock, Rebecca could barely look at the form sitting in front of her. She didn't really feel it was her place to be making this decision.

"She's right, Rebecca." Kitty sighed, reluctantly agreeing with her mother. "You're the one who got through to him when it came to all his problems, and you've helped him out in ways that none of us have been able to."

"Yeah." Kevin added. "I have to admit, he's been in a much better way since he's known you."

"Better then he's been in a long time." Tommy added.

Rebecca glanced at each of Justin's siblings nervously, still pondering on what to do. "Nora, are you sure you want me doing this?"

"I got to see him." Nora responded. "I honestly never thought I'd see him again, but I did. I got to talk to him, listen to him, hold his hand."

"But Nora,"

"But nothing." Nora interrupted. "You've saved him many times before, and I know he'd want you to be part of this decision."

Taking another deep, slow breath, Rebecca glanced over the form on the clipboard in her lap. Although it terrified her beyond all reason, she finally came to the conclusion about what she needed to do. Glancing over to see Justin's doctor standing by the counter of the receptionist's desk, she quickly rose from her seat and walked over to him.

"Excuse me?" Rebecca asked. "We've come to the decision on Justin Walker."

The doctor looked up from his charts on the counter for a moment. "Alright." He reached for the clipboard, but Rebecca held it back momentarily.

"It isn't signed yet." Rebecca said. She paused for a moment as he looked at her curiously. "I want to see him first."

"Are you family?"

"Yes." Rebecca said hesitantly.

"Alright, you can see him for a few moments."

"Is he conscious?"

"Last I checked, he was semi-conscious." The doctor said. "Right this way."

As he walked back down the main corridor of the ICU, Rebecca glanced at the Walkers one last time before following him. She passed all the same doors she had just a few minutes before, and when she passed his empty room, she knew for sure this was really happening. On the outside, she was struggling to keep her posture balanced, but on the inside she was a nervous wreck. She was scared out of her mind for him. There were so many things she wanted to tell him. She wanted him to know how much he was worth to the family, to the world, that he was the world to her. She wanted to hold his hand, tell him that everything would be alright, but at the same time she wasn't sure if she could do that. She started taking deeper breaths when they stopped at the doors for the emergency room. Through the windows of the large swinging doors, she could see him.

"You'll need to put a gown on." The doctor said, pointing to a small box of medical gowns on a nearby cart. Without a moment's haste, she quickly put one on over her clothes. She was struggling to keep her focus on the matter at hand, but it was becoming increasingly difficult. Within a few moments, she was ready to see him.

"Will you be alright?" The doctor asked.

Rebecca nodded.

"I'll be back in four or five minutes." He said, taking the form that Nora had signed from the clipboard and leaving the DNR form on the clipboard and resting that on the cart next to the box of gowns. Rebecca glanced at the form briefly before facing the doors. Taking one more deep, heavy breath, she gently pushed one of the doors open and entered the room.

* * *

Except for the center light, the room was in almost complete darkness. Te green and gray tiles on the floor and walls reminded her of scenes out of _Grey's Anatomy_, the silence being pierced by the rhythm tic beeping of the heart monitor next to the operating table Justin was laying on. As she slowly approached the center of the room, Justin's pale face came into view, as well as all of the machines he was hooked up to, which were keeping him alive. His eyes were closed, and his breathing sounded muffled. Rebecca bit her lip as she approached his side, trying to hold back her tears.

"_I'm right here, Justin."_ Rebecca whispered, stroking the side of his face. _"I'm right here."_

"_I'm right here, too."_ A hoarse voice arose from the silence, drawing Rebecca's attention to the arm which was now raised and the hand that was reaching for hers. She gasped when she saw his eyes slowly crack open just enough for him to see her.

"_Justin_." Rebecca sighed with a weak smile. _"Hey, baby."_

"_Hey, there." _Justin said weakly, barely loud enough for her to hear him. _"I heard you put up quite a fight out there."_

"_That was nothing_._"_ Rebecca sighed. _"For you."_

Justin cracked a grateful smile back at her, knowing very well of the sacrifices she'd made for him, just as the rest of the family had. His smile faded along with hers, as he could tell something wasn't right.

"_Justin." _Rebecca whispered softly. _"They're telling us-"_

"_Aortic Rupture."_ Justin interrupted in the same weak voice. _"From when I got shot."_

Rebecca's eyes widened quickly at his response. _"You knew?"_

"_I've seen it before with chest trauma."_ Justin muttered under his breath. Rebecca's throat tightened as she struggled to tell him what the doctors had told her and the others.

"_They say that they want to do surgery to repair the rupture." _Rebecca said in a low voice, her eyes slightly pointing to the floor. She was almost afraid to look at his face when she told him. _"Open-Heart surgery."_

Taking slow and steady deep breaths, Justin gently tilted his head back against the thin pillow on the upper end of the table, closing his eyes for a brief moment. He was so tired, all he wanted to do was sleep. But he fought to stay awake, because he knew very well if he fell asleep too soon, he'd probably never wake up.

"_I heard them talking about it before."_ Justin whispered. _"I know they don't think it looks too good."_

Rebecca bit her lip as she waited for the worst, but she was somewhat shocked to see that he barely responded to the prospect of his slim chances at all. He just laid there, motionless, slowly inhaling and exhaling.

"_Did they give you one to sign?" _Justin asked silently and sternly, his eyes still closed.

Without turning her head, Rebecca's thoughts turned her back to the clipboard sitting on the cart in the corridor leading into the emergency room. Her silence caused Justin to slowly open his eyes.

"_Rebecca." _Justin asked again. _"Did they give you one to sign?"_

Trembling slightly and fighting to hold back her tears, Rebecca reluctantly answered his question. _"Yes."_

Justin paused in silence for a moment, simply staring up into the lights above him. The occasional sharp pains in his chest told him time was running out, and now he was faced with a terrible decision.

"_Tear it up."_ Justin whispered, his eyes closed. _"Tear it up."_

Rebecca took a deep breath, closing her own eyes to clear her mind. In a way, she had a feeling he was going to say that. She tried to open her mouth, but she couldn't find the words to say. She didn't want him to be in anymore pain, but she wasn't willing to just let him give up either. She was torn directly between the two choices, but it seemed as though he'd already help make up her mind.

"_I'm not finished yet."_ Justin said, slowly opening his eyes. _"I'm not giving up on you."_

Although she admired his optimism, that twisting and turning feeling in her gut was painfully reminding her that reality was bent on a different course. From the look in his eyes, she could tell Justin was very well aware of this. He remained silent for several moments, trying to bring himself to tell her what was on his mind, and in his heart. Although he was still going to fight this, he knew very well that she deserved better than his stubborn attitude in a situation like that.

"_I didn't mean for any of this to happen."_ Justin sighed, squeezing his eyes momentarily as a sharp pain in his chest reminded him of his time. _"I'm sorry that I let this happen."_

"_Justin, this wasn't your fault!"_ Rebecca said in a scolding tone. _"Didn't everybody tell you that?"_

"_Rebecca, please." _Justin pleaded, looking her square in the eyes. Although she didn't agree with it at all, she reluctantly nodded her head, trying to allow him to have some dignity. The two of them found themselves in another moment of silence, where either one couldn't find the words to say. Rebecca could feel her heart pounding faster and the tears were slowly filling her eyes. The same tears she began to see forming in his eyes told her how hard he was trying to bring himself to say goodbye.

"_Of all the dumb mistakes I've made, I know there was at least one thing in my life that I'm glad I had." _He whispered, choking over his own words as two tears rolled down the side of his face._ "That was finding you."_

Those words hit Rebecca hard, as she felt her knees buckle and her legs give way from beneath her. She knelt by his side as she sobbed into the thin sheet that was covering him, grasping his hand gently.

"_Can you do something for me?" _Justin asked hoarsely. Rebecca looked up, gently nodding her head as she wiped the tears from her eyes.

"_Tell them." _He sighed. Knowing what he meant, Rebecca nodded her head once more.

_And another thing," _Justin whispered. "_Remember this: 8-3-5-4-5-1-9"_

She nodded again, trying to store those numbers into her memory. Part of her wanted to question what they were for, but the rest of her could hardly pay any attention. _Anything else?"_

"_Catch a wave for me." _Justin said, cracking a weak smile.

"_Justin, you know I can't surf."_

"_Hey, if My Dad can learn, I think you can too."_

Smirking slightly, Rebecca nodded once more. Justin paused for a moment when he saw over Rebecca's shoulder, one of the surgeons standing behind the large doors.

"_It's time." _Justin sighed. Rebecca glanced behind her to see the doctor she'd spoken to earlier standing in the doorway.

"Are we ready?" The doctor asked in a low voice.

"Almost." Rebecca responded, trying to regain her voice.

"_Wait." _Justin said, gently clasping her wrist before she could pull her hand away. _Do you still have the ring?"_

"Yeah." Rebecca said, reaching beneath her gown into the pocket of her sweater and pulling out the small box.

"_Would you do me the honors of letting me put this on your hand?" _Justin asked silently. Pausing for a moment, Rebecca gently nodded her head as she placed the box into Justin's hand. She watched as he flipped open the lid, pulled out the ring, with the blue stone shining in the light, and then reaching for her outstretched hand.

"_I want you to keep this forever." _Justin whispered, glancing occasionally at each of the four doctors and nurses in the room. _"So, you'll remember me."_

Feeling the tears coming back, Rebecca fought desperately to fight them off. "I'll never take it off."

As he slid the ring on to her ring finger of her right hand, she knew what he'd originally planned to do. She decided not to be angry or sad, but to be strong, for him.

"We'll be administering the drugs to help him sleep now." One of the nurses said, walking past Rebecca with a tray of syringes. "You need to go back with the doctor now."

"Wait." Rebecca interrupted. "Can I be here with him, just until he falls asleep?" The nurse looked back to the doctor, who was slowly nodding his head with a weak smile on his face.

"Of course." The nurse whispered as she picked up the first of three syringes. Not saying anything, Rebecca simply clasped Justin's hand with both of hers, looking him directly in the eyes. She listened to his breathing becoming heavier and heavier as he stared back at her. After the second syringe of drugs had been injected into his IV line, she could see his eyelids sinking over his eyes.

"_See you later."_ Justin whispered just moment before his eyes slid shut. Rebecca froze for several moments, breathing heavily as she felt his hand go limp in hers. She gently rested his hand at his side, still fighting off the tears.

"_I've got to be strong." _She told herself sternly in her head. _"I've got to be strong."_

Shaking off her fears, she slowly leaned over and kissed him, gently holding the side of his scruffy jaw in her hand.

Behind her, she could feel the doctor put his hand on her shoulder. "You need to come with me, they're going to start soon."

As he led her away, she occasionally glanced back as they began preparing him for surgery. Once in the hallway, she gently peeled the gown off her body. In front of the doctor, Rebecca hastily pulled the DNR form from the clipboard and tore it right down the middle. "He didn't want me to sign it."

Nodding silently, The doctor led her back to the rest of the Walkers, knowing very well what to tell them. With every step, she kept telling herself the same thing in her mind.

"_I've got to be strong, I've got to be strong."_

To Be Continued…..


	34. Time

Chapter 34 – Time

Rebecca stared blankly into the blurry white surface she was laying beneath, her entire body numb from lying still for such a long time. For the fourth time, she slowly turned her head to glance over at the alarm clock by her bed, amidst the trinkets she'd collected since moving into her apartment. It still said 8:46 AM, meaning that only two minutes had passed since she'd looked at it last. For a moment, she squinted as a few rays of sunlight poked through her curtains. She looked up to see the sun partially hidden behind the palm trees which stood tall above the courtyard they'd been planted in.

As she slowly sat up, the black dress she was wearing brought back the painful memories of the events of the previous day. The dreary, cloudy day that had ended some twelve hours earlier would be hard to forget, even on the sunniest day. Every sound she'd heard, every word she'd spoken, every sight she'd seen, she just wished she could take it all back. Her fingers twitched as she got the sudden urge to run away from everything, escape from it all and just run to him. She wanted to jump into his arms and just hold him tightly, hold him and never let go. Unfortunately, it would mean she'd be running forever, as yesterday had been the day that he had been laid to rest beneath a polished stone bearing his name, identical to his father's stone, overlooking the lily pond amongst the mangrove trees.

As Rebecca slipped numbly back into her bed, the ten days since her arrival back in California was an almost endless stream of painful memories, one right after another. The plane ride back to the states had been a nightmare, as the rough turbulence they'd faced quite a deal of made it practically impossible to sleep. However, during the entire flight, Nora had never left her side. She remembered the first night after it had happened, how neither of them had slept one single moment. They both stayed awake, softly crying in the darkness and praying that it was all just a nightmare. When the story of how they had journeyed half-way around the world and into the war-torn nation of Iraq to find him was all over the news, that only made coping that much more difficult. The fact that eleven civilians, two of whom were children, stormed the barren deserts of one of the most politically unstable regions in the world and defeated a militant group baffled many. Some said the militant group was already weakened, others said that the Walkers just got lucky, but some said it was just a drastic measure a family needed to make for one of their own.

She was constantly exhausted, barely able to function for the first few days. She remembered crumbling into her mom's arms almost the second Holly had first approached her. She'd stayed at her childhood home for a few days, which didn't help things much considering that ever since meeting the Walker Family, she couldn't even look at the house without thinking of William, from whom her thoughts would eventually wander to Justin. The shock had rocked her so badly that eating was even a problem. It must have been something in the desert that did it to her, but for some strange reason everything tasted like rubber. Ever since that moment in the middle of the night, when the surgeon walked into the waiting room. It was at thirteen minutes to midnight that he had died on the operating table, the massive surgery too much of a strain on his heart. The shock had hit Rebecca so hard that she'd thrown up right there in the waiting room.

Rebecca had seen everything unfold right before her eyes. The Walker Family had been devastated by Justin's death in so many ways, more than any of them could even keep count of. Nora had to spend two nights in the hospital, rocked so terribly by the shock. It took enough sedatives to knock out an alligator to get her to finally sleep, and many doctors were worried about her being in that big, empty house all by herself. By the time the first week had passed since returning home, she'd lost almost twenty pounds because her health was so rapidly deteriorating. Luckily, Sarah volunteered to move in with Nora for a short time in order to look after her. Sarah's biggest struggle was facing her children to tell them what had happened. She remembered how Cooper used to love watching Justin play Super Mario Brothers on his old Nintendo. She wondered if he'd ever even touch it again. Paige took her uncle's death much harder than her little brother. She was older and able to understand what had really happened to him, making it hard for her to cope. When she'd first been diagnosed with Diabetes, Justin had played a crucial role in teaching her how to handle the needles, giving herself her insulin, and checking her blood sugar throughout each and every day. Just before moving into her mother's house, Sarah had gotten a call from Joe, learning that Paige had signed up to start taking First Aid courses at the YMCA. She said she wanted to be a medic someday, just like him.

Kitty had opened her heart in the time of mourning as Jadia and Sabriya had nowhere to go to but that orphanage back in that village. She and Robert when through hell-over-water to get them visas to come to the United States, and to begin the adoption process. When Kitty and Robert confronted the two girls on coming to live with them, they both were all too quick to say yes. They'd grown attached to the family very fast, which was a good thing considering what they'd been through. Justin's death had been especially hard for the two girls, because they both felt responsible. They kept thinking to themselves if they had gotten there faster, or been more careful about getting caught, maybe he would still be with them. The first night in their new home, they both sat on the balcony of the guest bedroom which would eventually become the room they would share. They burned a candle and prayed late into the night, and Kitty decided to Join them. While she was praying that night, Kitty reflected back to her days with her radio show, and on _The Red, White, and Blue_, and found herself deeply regretting having defended the war which cost her brother his life. When Trish heard about Justin, she offered to let them know what the sex of the baby was, if they were hoping to honor him by using his name. Although Kitty and Robert declined, they did keep it in mind. Justin's death was also rather traumatic for Robert, he himself being a fellow veteran. There were nights whereas he'd wake up drenched in sweat after having that nightmare where he'd re-live the helicopter crash he'd been in during the Gulf War. The most traumatic part of the dream was that in the place of the pilot who had died, was Justin.

Tommy was on the verge of a nervous breakdown from the second he and Julia had arrived back home. As the cuts and scrapes, sunburns and strained muscles healed, he sunk into a cone of silence, trying to wrap his head around what had happened. The guilt seemed to be eating him alive. He'd come so close to saving him, to bringing him home, and he blew it. Julia wasn't fairing much better, as the sight of the war had a profound effect on her. In addition to that, she was trying to figure out how to face the obstacle which had driven her to step into the desert in the first place, which was what she'd tell Elizabeth about who had delivered her in that vineyard. Kevin and Scotty were both on the edge, as Kevin had seen Justin go into cardiac arrest when he first started hemorrhaging. Ever since then, Kevin just about jumped right out of his skin at the sound of any loud beeping. Scotty did his best to ward off the reporters and journalists trying to get more on the family's quest, but at the same time was fighting with his own battles. Growing up in Mississippi, Scotty had heard stories of the horrors of the violence seen in the years before the civil rights movement. Although he'd never actually seen any of it, he knew very well how it happened. He never could comprehend that it could get as bad as the violence Justin had endured, never in a million years.

Rebecca talked to them every chance she could, as they did for her. She was once again coming to understand the major advantage of having such a large family, as each was eager and needing to help each other in these times. She truly needed the help, because no matter where she looked, she saw him. She was glad for the time she got to spend with him. The fact that he'd gone from her half-brother to her boyfriend in barely a year still made her laugh, but the humor was bittersweet, just like almost every other good thought she tried to force into her mind. She knew facing reality was part of the healing process, but she just hoped she could do it without going out of her mind.

* * *

Despite the tragic circumstances, Justin's landlord was eager to prepare the apartment for a new tenant, so he had constantly been pressuring the Walkers to collect Justin's things. It had escalated to a point whereas he was threatening to throw everything away. Finally, Sarah decided that she would start. Rebecca had offered to help her, and knew that day was not going to be an easy one. After taking a quick shower, Rebecca headed out to meet Sarah. As soon as she stepped onto her mother's front porch, the bright sunlight blinded her for a few seconds, making her momentarily step back into the shadows. After getting into her car, she struggled to get back into the routine of driving. She came close to running a stop sign twice on her trek across Pasadena, and almost rear-ended somebody at the intersection down the street from Justin's old building. As soon as she pulled into the parking lot, she could feel herself tremble slightly before almost going numb from the shock. It was the first time she'd been there since it had happened. When she saw Sarah's SUV parked out front of Justin's apartment door, she felt a bit better knowing she wasn't in this alone. She parked her car next to Sarah's, and once she got out, she slowly began taking steps towards the door of his apartment. Seeing the door was open, as well as a few boxes sitting in the back of Sarah's SUV, she knew his sister must have already gotten started. Rebecca stood hesitantly in the doorway, thinking about whether or not Sarah would want the help at the moment. Shaking off her doubts, she stepped into Justin's small kitchen. The cabinet doors were all open, and the few dishes and cooking utensils he'd collected were all piled into three boxes, sitting in the center of the floor. In one corner, a garbage can filled with old and expired food sat fermenting in the heat, while in another corner a chair sat, with several small boxes stacked on top of it.

Taking a deep breath, Rebecca stepped into the living room, looking for Sarah. This area was hard for her to look through, as a thin layer of dust across everything told her that nothing had been touched since he'd been there last. On the leather sofa, two blankets were twisted together and pushed to the side, where he had slept that night before it had happened. A half-empty can of Pepsi sat on the coffee table between the TV and the couch, along with several gum wrappers. His old pair of canvas sneakers were laying on the floor in front of where she stood, reminding her of their walks on the beaches and in the park. Whenever they could see each other, they most often just went for walks. Whether it be along Long Beach or just to the gas station around the corner, it was just what they did. They'd had some of their best talks during those times. She gently cracked a smile as the memories of him reminded her of some good times. Unfortunately, like many others, the joy was all too soon ended. Kneeling there on the floor, she felt that stabbing pain inside her and she felt like she wanted to cry. But she couldn't cry anymore, as it was almost as if she'd grown numb to the pain.

"He always choose those kinds of sneakers." A voice said from across the room. Rebecca glanced up to see Sarah standing in his bedroom doorway. As she looked, she could see Sarah's haggard face was a sign that Justin's eldest sibling hadn't slept much over the past few nights, not that she could blame her. "He'd just grab 'em and go."

Trying desperately to crack a smile, Rebecca nodded her head. "He did like them."

"He used to say that the average person spends a grand total of thirty days or more over the course of their lives tying shoes, so he used these to kind of save that time." Sarah said, shuffling over to Rebecca's side and gently sitting down next to her. "Every year when we were kids, Mom would buy five or six pairs of them at once for him, because he'd wear them out so fast."

Rebecca remembered the past pairs he'd owned, all in that faded blue color. She never was a big fan of those kinds of shoes, because they gave her blisters. Justin never really seemed to mind that though. He'd keep walking in a pair until they fell apart from beneath his feet, quite literally.

"_These sneaks still have a long ways to go on them." _Rebecca said humorously, repeating Justin's words. _"Heck, I haven't even gotten out the duct tape yet."_

Sarah snickered silently, but only for a moment or two. Before long, the two women found themselves trapped in the silence of his musty apartment. All over the place, there were things still where he had last left them, and it was very painful to remove them.

"I'm really going to miss him." Sarah muttered, lowering her head for a brief moment and resting her forehead in the palm of her hand.

Rebecca said nothing, although she wanted to. After another moment of silence, Sarah glanced at Rebecca's hand, seeing the ring still on her finger. After another moment or two, a gentle nod and a weak smile from Sarah reminded Rebecca of the change she had brought out in Justin.

"How's your mom doing?" Rebecca asked softly.

"She hasn't been out of her room in two days." Sarah responded. "I've never seen her this bad before."

Rebecca nodded, understanding Nora's grief. "How are you doing?"

"To be honest, it doesn't hurt as much as I thought it would." Sarah said, surprising Rebecca to a point whereas she was almost completely snapped out of the daze she'd been stuck in.

"Don't get me wrong, but it just feels different than I thought it would have." Sarah sighed, crossing her arms as she sat on the floor. Rebecca looked at her curiously, trying to understand Sarah's reasoning. Understanding the confusion, Sarah tried to explain.

"I think it might be knowing the fact that he finally made it gives me some peace of mind." Sarah said in the same soft voice. "Trust me, If you'd seen the way he was before, you'd probably understand."

Rebecca nodded, knowing of Justin's rough times.

"You know what really tipped the scale for me?" Sarah stated. "When I saw them in the hospital, even though he was hurt so bad, he was smiling. _He was actually smiling._"

Cracking a weak smile, Rebecca thought of Justin's sleek grin, which when done at the right moments made her weak in the knees. She remembered when he'd hold her as they sat on that park bench atop that hill, overlooking the city. They'd go up there late at night and look at the stars, out where the purple hue from the city lights wasn't as strong. She'd rest her head on his shoulder and they'd be out there until two o'clock in the morning, just talking and holding each other.

"You gave him that, you know." Sarah said, catching Rebecca's attention. "He could smile again because of you."

Rebecca struggled to crack a smile again, but just looked to the floor nervously as she did so.

"I know I've probably told you that a few dozen times, but it's the truth." Sarah stated. "You brought him back to life."

Rebecca nodded her head slightly, lifting her hand to gently wipe the tears from her eyes. The song _Travellin' Soldier _by the Dixie Chicks had been stuck in her head ever since it had happened. The line that stuck in the most was "_I cried, never gonna hold the hand of another guy_."

"You will go on, Rebecca." Sarah sighed. "We all will, in due time."

Nodding her head again, Rebecca glanced through the doorway into Justin's bedroom. Amidst the stacks of sheets and blankets, a rather interesting object caught her attention.

"Sarah, what's that?" Rebecca asked.

"What's what?" Sarah responded.

"That box on the bed."

"Oh, that's something I found in his trunk in the closet." Sarah responded, glancing at the black metal box. "Don't know what's in it, it's locked."

Rebecca held her breath as she looked at Sarah. She glanced back at the box, and when she saw there was a dial combination on the latch, she slowly rose to her feet.

"Rebecca?"

"I know how to open it." Rebecca said, crossing into the bedroom and stopping at the foot of the bed. She immediately remembered that sequence of numbers Justin had told her when she saw the combination consisted of seven numbers. As she picked up the box, which felt as if it weighed about ten or fifteen pounds, and stood in silence for a moment.

"Rebecca?" Sarah asked from behind her. "Do you know what that box is?"

"No." Rebecca responded. "I just know how to open it."

"What?" Sarah asked in a whisper as Rebecca slowly rolled each of the seven brass scrolls in the lock into alignment until they read the same number he'd told her. Her heart jumped when she heard the lock click. Sarah stepped to Rebecca's side as Rebecca flipped open the locks and slowly opened the cover. She paused for a moment, recoiling at the fact that whatever was in that box, had been last touched by him. She slowly sat down on the bed, as did Sarah, both of them gazing at the ruffled brown paper concealing the object within the box. Rebecca carefully pushed the paper aside to reveal what looked like an old photo album. Rebecca turned to Sarah when she heard her gasp.

"That was our Dad's." Sarah said, gently stroking her hand over the dark brown leather cover. "I can't believe he kept it."

"I'm guessing there's a story to this?" Rebecca asked. Sarah nodded.

"When Dad was away at war in Korea, he took this old leather photo album with him that had pictures and stuff reminding him of what was important in his life. His friends, his home, his hobbies, and Mom. Even after the war ended and he came home he kept it and actually kept adding to it. He'd always catch Justin looking through it, and he thought it might be a good idea if Justin had one of his own."

"Ah, I see." Rebecca said softly. "That must have been a good idea."

"Well, not always." Sarah sighed. "Every time Justin slipped into one of his downward spirals, he'd burn all the pages and try to start over. After so many times, I thought he'd given up on that by now."

After barely a moment's pause, Rebecca gently lifted the front cover of the album open, not prepared for what was inside. She flinched for a second, as if wanting to close her eyes out of the fear of once again facing the fact that he was really gone. The pause lasted for one second, then another, and then another. After about thirteen of them, Rebecca trembled slightly as she thought to herself. _"I have to see him."_

She forced herself to look at the first page, and found herself looking at his acceptance letter into medical school. He hadn't taped it to one of the album pages yet, as it was only laying loosely under the front cover. Once she moved it out of the way, she found herself looking at a solid page of what looked like dozens-even hundreds of words that had been clipped out of newspapers and magazines. Surfing, Run, Climbing, Breathe, Color, Live, and many more.

"Inspiration." Rebecca sighed. "I did a project like this in high school and I showed it to him once." As she and Sarah glanced over the collage, they almost didn't notice the drawing in blue sharpie on the faded sheet of notebook paper. When it first caught Sarah's eye, Rebecca saw immediately that subtle spark in her eyes, that triggering of a memory.

"My God." Sarah gasped, reaching for the sheet of paper. "He really was a pack rat."

After a small snicker, Rebecca looked curiously at the sheet of paper they had found.

"Is that a map?" Rebecca asked.

"Yep." Sarah responded. "The beach at Ojai."

"Was there something particularly interesting about this beach?"

"Well, it's really secluded, hardly anybody ever goes out there." Sarah explained, pointing out the landmarks Justin had drawn into this map. "When we were kids, we'd all sneak out there with our Dad every summer and go surfing. There were just the best waves there."

_Waves….Waves…..Waves….._

That word resonated in Rebecca's mind for a moment, bringing her back to the last time she saw Justin alive. As painful as it was, the memory came back to her full and clear. He said he wanted her to catch a wave for him.

* * *

Ojai was a good two hours outside of Los Angeles, up the coast towards the north. The interstate soon gave way to county roads and private drives, winding through the hills of the countryside. The sunlight periodically broke through the canopy of trees which shaded the road, transforming it into a leafy-green tunnel. Every ray of light that shined through the windshield of Sarah's SUV made Rebecca's eyes flinch. She sat in the front passenger seat, with the backrest tilted back. She occasionally glanced at Sarah, silently staring out at the road in front of her, and Kitty, in the same silence, staring out the window of the backseat as the scenery flashed by. She was shocked as ever when they offered to go with her, considering the loss of their brother. She could see their pain in their eyes, but struggled desperately not to say anything that would make it worse. On the other hand, the silence was driving her mad, that Dixie Chicks song still stuck in her head.

"Hey, Kit?" Sarah asked Kitty, breaking the silence. In the rear-view mirror, Sarah could see her sister's face looking in her own direction.

"Do you remember that Ice Cream Parlor Dad used to take us when we were little?"

Kitty paused for a moment, her face absent of expression. "Vaguely."

"I was just thinking of the last time he took us there before it went out of business." Sarah said, glancing at Rebecca. "It was the summer before I started High School and you were so ticked that you'd be stuck in Junior High all by yourself.

Kitty cracked a smile, remembering that summer. "I remember I would describe the separation as 'solitary confinement'"

As the two sisters kept talking, Rebecca thought to herself how they'd already been through this before, after William died. Having to re-visit all the stages of their lives that they shared with their father, slowly inching their way towards acceptance of the fact that he was gone. The thought of having to do the same for Justin made her slowly close her eyes and rest her head against the window.

When she opened her eyes again, she was greeted with the broad horizon of the Pacific Ocean, waves crashing against the sandy beach. As Rebecca awoke from her sleep, she saw both Sarah and Kitty sitting motionless in their seats, Kitty leaning forward towards the center aisle of Sarah's SUV. They didn't notice that she was awake at first, but Rebecca could clearly see that they both had been crying. Before long, they both saw that Rebecca was awake, but they didn't say anything for a few moments.

"Well, shall we catch some waves?" Sarah asked, wiping her eyes with a weak smile.

The three women climbed out of the SUV, bags in hand, and turned to the three surfboards on the roof of the vehicle, once they got them free of their bindings, they began carrying the long boards down to the beach. As they walked between the small sand dunes, Rebecca took deep breaths of the salty air, a light breeze blowing through her hair. The drive up there took a bit longer than expected, apparently because of road construction. Despite the sorrow hanging over her head, Rebecca was excited to see the beach that he had told her so much about. She briefly closed her eyes and remembered his smile, and the chuckle in his voice when he talked about how he and Tommy had tried and tried to teach their sisters how to surf. It took a couple summer trips, but before long Sarah and Kitty managed to get the hang of surfing.

"Well, ladies?" Sarah asked, board under her arm. "Shall we suit up?"

Kitty and Rebecca eagerly nodded as they quickly settled into a small camp against the sloped edge of a sand dune on the beach. While they were putting on their wetsuits, Rebecca saw Sarah blink back a few tears. She wanted to say something to comfort her, _again_, but hesitated in order to prevent herself from saying the wrong thing, _again_. She wondered if she would ever get the hang of it.

Barely ten minutes after they'd waxed their boards and lined up to catch the surf, Sarah picked up her first wave. It was small, only about eight or ten feet, but the first one Kitty picked up must have been between ten and fifteen feet. Rebecca watched from atop her board as the two sisters rode the full length of the wave before it leveled out and lost momentum, sending them gliding towards shore. Kitty rolled off her board a few times as she came in, but before Rebecca could even think to laugh, she saw it. In front of her, what looked like about a hundred yards in distance in front of her, was a wave which looked like it would be at least twelve feet tall.

"_Go, Rebecca! Paddle!_" Kitty shouted from near the beach. Rebecca quickly laid herself on the board, facing down, and started paddling. She was a bit nervous, considering she'd only been surfing twice before, both with Justin. As she broke through the small waves, she could feel the tears stinging her eyes along with the water.

"_I have to do this, I have to do this!" _She told herself as she grunted tirelessly to paddle faster. As the wave approached, she aimed for the perfect spot of entry. She listened to Justin's voice in her memory, as hard as it was to do. "_Follow the contour of the wave to determine the direction the wave will die out in, from left to right or from right to left. Sweep in parallel to the wave and enjoy the ride."_

His words brought her some comfort as she came within a few yards of the wave. Just as he had taught her, she turned the board against the curled face of the wave and when she stopped paddling, the board kept moving. She was riding. Keeping her balance, she slowly stood up, balancing herself with her arms. Her heart was pounding and her hair had come loose from the ponytail she had tied it into, as it now was matted against her face. The roar of the wave gave her a powerful sensation, the feeling that she had conquered some ferocious sea monster and was riding it like a Shetland pony at the county fair. She smiled as the wave picked up speed before it began to lose power. Gently turning out of the wave, she began to softly laugh. Looking back at the wave as it collapsed into the sea, she smiled. As she inhaled and exhaled while riding into shore, she felt it as a sigh of relief. The entire way there she wondered if she'd be able to do it. Ever since they'd come home, she'd gotten this stabbing pain in her chest every time she saw a can of his favorite kind of pop, but she'd just done something that was a large part of who Justin Walker was, and it didn't hurt. It felt good. For a split second, she forgot he was dead. That second meant everything to her.

"You did it!" Kitty squealed over the roar of the waves crashing against the beach. As she was coming in, she saw something else that helped numb that pain. Even though he was gone, they still wanted her as a part of their family. She'd rather have had him back, but the sight of his sisters waiting for her gave her hope that things would get better. As she watched Kitty jump up and down a few times, and saw Sarah laughing, Rebecca stepped off her board and into the water. As the board glided onto the sand, Rebecca joined Kitty and Sarah on the beach.

"That was awesome!" Kitty exclaimed, putting her arm around Rebecca's shoulder.

"I have to agree." Sarah added. "That was some ride, couldn't have done it better myself."

Rebecca scoffed, crossing her arms. "Of course you could have."

Sarah nodded, adhering to the sarcasm. "Well, you're probably right, but it was still one heck of a ride."

"Did you two get good rides?"

"I think I did." Sarah said, looking out over the water. "I remember he and Kevin and Tommy used to say surfing is the best thing to do in order to unwind."

"I agree," Kitty said. "It felt good."

The three women smiled, but it was brief. After a few moments, the glowing sunset reminded them of how quickly the afternoon had passed by. Rebecca looked at the California sunset, the large glowing red sun shrouded amongst a few thin lines of clouds. Standing there, their shadows cast upon the sand, the three women were reminded by the glow of the sunset of the reason for their visit to the beach. The sound of the waves crashing into the shore couldn't drown out the yells and cries of his voice in their memories. The fact that he wasn't coming back hadn't sunk in yet. Shivering in the cold water, Rebecca gently crossed her arms, her lip trembling. Out of the corner of her eye, Sarah saw two tears roll down Kitty's face. Feeling her own coming on, she reached out to the both of them to lead them back to shore, and out of the water.

* * *

Darkness fell over the beach rapidly as the waves continued to crash ashore, a soft breeze seeping sand across the dunes. Three surfboards stood silhouetted by the star-filled sky, their sleek waxed surfaces shining in the flickering light coming from the campfire. Rebecca stared blankly into space, her eyes darting from one star to the next. She kept wondering if he could see her, if he knew she was there. Ever since it had happened, she'd spent every starry night staring into the darkness, as if she was hoping to catch even the smallest sign from him, a small flicker, a shooting star, anything. Although it was exhausting, she couldn't stop. The one thing that did provide her some comfort was that she'd fulfilled his last request. It was one more step in what seemed to her would be an endless staircase into oblivion. After what seemed like ages of laying still in the warm sand, Rebecca looked to see what Sarah and Kitty were doing. Kitty was asleep, rolled up tightly in a beach towel, while Sarah was sitting upright, facing the horizon overlooking the Pacific. Without barely moving an inch, Rebecca shifted her gaze back towards the stars. As she did, she could hear Sarah humming a song that sounded like it had a Hawaiian tune to it. Sarah also mumbled softly an old song.

_You'll find your way,_

Sarah sang softly in the darkness as Rebecca listened. The continuous roar of the waves seemed to soften over time in her ears as other memories began to take over.

_Come what may,_

Her memories faded back to the first time she met him, on her mother's doorstep on that crisp autumn evening. That night had been a turning point in her life, a turn for the better.

_The voices of those who you love fill the world around you."_

Memories faded in and out, dinners, dances, fights, jumping in the pool in one of her best dresses, going to nineteen different gas stations to find his favorite kind of beef jerky for his care package, falling asleep next to him on the couch after an afternoon of channel surfing, and fixing his cufflinks on that night they went out to dinner. She took deep breaths to calm her nerves every time her memories faded back to that night.

_The time will come,_

The wind blew across her face, dusting her occasionally with sand from the beach.

_The wait shall be done,_

Rebecca blinked a few times.

_And we shall meet again…….._

* * *

Rebecca blinked once more, and then it happened. The stars disappeared, the darkness disappeared, everything vanished before her eyes. The Pacific seemed to have dried up into a rather unforgiving looking desert, silhouetted by a hazy , glowing sunset. Before long she began to recognize her surroundings. She found herself on the stone bench just outside two steel doors on the outside edge of the building which housed the station's infirmary. Blinking wildly, she felt a sudden urge of hope and utter excitement. It had been just a dream, a simple, silly dream!

Taking deep, rapid breaths, she quickly leapt to her feet and walked swiftly towards the doors nearby. Her heart pounding faster, she made a sharp turn down the corridor, the fluorescent lights stinging her eyes. Before long, she found herself running towards the waiting room. Near the front desk, there was a small red clock mounted on the wall. She eagerly glanced to see what time it was. 9:14 PM, barely thirty minutes since he'd been in surgery. Her pace slowed as she arrived in the waiting room.

"Rebecca, where have you been?" Kitty asked from one of the sofas. "We were getting worried."

"Oh, I just stepped outside to get a breath of fresh air." Rebecca sputtered between her deep breaths. Her vision quickly drooped from the Walkers to the floor tiles as she tried to catch her breath.

"Was there any word?" Rebecca asked. "Anything at all?"

From across the lobby, Nora softly shook her head. After a moment of silence, Rebecca slowly stepped around the sofas and armchairs in which Justin's semi-conscious siblings rested in and took a seat next to Nora.

"Nora?" Rebecca asked softly, hoping to gain her attention. "I need to tell you something."

Nora looked up, her eyes very pale and red from crying. "Did you sign it?" She asked.

Caught off guard, Rebecca paused for a moment. "What?"

"The DNR." Nora sighed. "Just tell me, did you sign it?"

After another moment's pause, Rebecca slowly shook her head. "He wouldn't let me. He hasn't given up yet."

Nora struggled to crack a weak smile. "Stubborn as a mule, that's my Justin."

Rebecca chuckled at the remark briefly before slumping back into the sofa. Her eyes stared blankly into the ceiling tiles as her thoughts drifted in and out. She was so tired, all she wanted to do was sleep. She wanted to stay awake for him, to be there, but she just couldn't hold up her strength much longer. As she felt her eyelids grow heavier and heavier, she thought to herself of the last time she'd seen him before this happened, at that restaurant. She wished this too was a dream, that when she woke up, he'd be there, safe and sound. She wanted it all to be a dream.

To Be Continued…..

Author's Note

Sorry it took me so long to finish this story. I just started into my fourth year of college and with working two jobs, life gets a little chaotic. But I always try to carve out time to write. Tell me what you think of this chapter in particular.


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